Dad, today is your birthday and it saddens my heart that I can't wrap my arms around you and tell you happy birthday in person. It saddens my heart that I can't celebrate your birthday with you! But today Dad, my birthday gift to you is a small token of my love for you. Today for your birthday I will bless you with the words, I forgive you.
Her heart thudded against the walls that enclosed it. The first thud was pure anger. The second thud was disbelief. The third thud was concern. Why do people choose to do these things? Where is God when these horrible things are happening? These small children woke up for a normal day of school. Little did they know that today would turn out to be a day that would change their lives and their families lives forever. Why someone chose to walk into that school and start shooting is beyond me! But I do know that my heart is heavy! All I want to do is wrap those children in my arms and hold them until everything is over. I want to take their pain away. Why can't I take their pain away? I don't like to know other people are hurting! It doesn't seem fair that these poor little ones have to go through something so traumatizing. Today I don't feel like I should smile or laugh or have fun while others are going through something so major. How do we go on when so many are hurting? I struggle with that question. Why should I go on in live when so any others live seem to have stopped due to pain? I have learned that I can't fix everyone's pain. I can't make things go away for them. But I can pray for them. Often it seems like such a small thing but I know for a fact that when people tell me they are praying for my family it makes the world of a difference. So today lets come together in prayer. Every small prayer counts. Pray for the family's who have lost loved ones. Pray for healing for those who are injured. Most of all pray for those who were affected. Pray that this will not allow them to become bitter but that it would draw them to the Lord. Pray that over Christmas they would feel Jesus holding them! Pray makes a difference!
"Its crowded in worship today, but she slips in trying to fade into the faces. The girl's teasing laughter is carrying farther than they know.... A stranger is far away from home and sheds his coat and quietly slips into the back row. The weight of their judgmental glances tells him that his chances are better out on the road." Today these lines in Casting Crowns' song, "If We are the Body" have really struck me. How many times have I seen someone try to fade into the faces and I just stood there and watched and didn't go make them feel like they are someone? How many times has my teasing voice carried farther than I realized? How many times has your teasing laughter carried farther than you realized? The song goes on to say that if we are the body than why aren't his arms reaching? Why aren't his hands healing? Why aren't his words teaching? Why aren't his feet going? Why is his love not showing them there is a way? How many times have I hindered God's body from reaching someone? I am suppose to show people that everyone is loved by God instead of showing them that only if you have a good past, only if you look and dress a certain way can you receive the love of Christ. The song goes on the say that Jesus paid too high a price for us to pick and choose who should go. If we are the body we need to reach out to others. We need to go make that stranger feel he is welcome and allow him to feel the love of God. I am sure that we wouldn't want to be the person that feels odd and unwelcome. I am sure we have all at some point felt that and I am sure that we didn't like the feeling. Since we didn't like the feeling, do you think others like that feeling? No one like to feel unwelcome and left out so lets put an effort forth to welcome everyone no matter how they look and no matter what their pasts holds. God welcomes everyone and since we are his hands and feet then we need to welcome everyone too. That stranger may have never heard the love of Christ and you may be his only chance. Lets be the hands and feet of Jesus and show the love of God. Lets stop judging and allow people to have a chance. Guys judging people does not define who they are it defines who we are. " Do not judge. You don't know what storm I have asked her to walk through!" -God Lets be the hands and feet of Jesus.
Four years came and went with a phone call here and a couple texts there, yet I never did see his face. A part of me was glad he never did show his face. Not seeing him helped me work through the pain and rejection he left me. I knew seeing him would stir up so many feelings and I didn't want to work through them again. But the time to see his face again crept up on me this Thanksgiving. The day had come to see my Dad after four years. My body was telling me not to go see him but my heart was telling me it would be the right thing to do. Finally I lifted my face to heaven and whispered, "Lord, if you want me to see him then I will. But you will have to make it possible. " I knew that seeing my Dad again was another step in the endless forgiveness process. And I knew that this was a way I could show my brothers how good it was to forgive Dad for all the pain he caused us. That evening there were butterfly's bouncing up against the walls of my stomach. Everything within me was telling me to run. But I made that short trek over to my Uncles store and opened the door. The door slammed behind me and I looked around. On top of the steps my eyes caught sight of the face that promised me he would never leave. The face that hurt me and rejected me. Instead of screaming at him and telling him how wrong this was that I couldn't just go home an see my Dad like normal 19 year old girls, I embraced him. I sat with him and my aunt and we talked for awhile. In those 20 minutes that we talked, never did my father ask me a question about myself. Never did he ask me if I'm still pursuing my dreams he always told me to chase. How could I look at him and still feel sorry for him and love him? My answer is short. GOD. God gave me strength to make it through that night. God gave me strength to once again forgive him. Yes, this weekend has been extremely hard on my family with seeing my dad again. Many things we had worked through and had overcome we now have to go backwards and rework through them again But because of God and His promise to never leave us, we will make it. Because of God I can love my dad even when he hurts me. This weekend I have learned how amazing freedom is and how amazing it is to forgive and move on with life. I am so thankful for my God and His plan for salvation. Most of all I am extremely thankful to have a heavenly father who never breaks His promise. His promise of never forsaking us. God gives us hard things but He doesn't give us more than we can handle. Thank-you Lord, for helping me forgive my father and for helping me up those many steps of the forgiveness process. Thank-you Lord, for turning ashes into beauty. Thank-you Lord for coming into my own life and being a Father to me and filling the voids in my heart my earthly father left. Lord, thank-you for not giving me more than I can handle. Lord, you mean so much to me and I just wanted to tell you that I hunger for you and I love you!
Today I realized something about myself. I realized I am a loner. I don't always like to do things alone but I often do. The reason why is simple. When I do things alone I don't have to worry about hurting anyone and I don't have to worry about getting hurt. When I'm alone the only person that can get hurt is me and I'm not going to hurt myself. I play the game of life safely. But here is the question. Is this a good thing? Is it good for me to do things alone just because I am scared of getting hurt? I don't think so. Christ did not create me to be alone. He created me to be a friend. How can I be someone's friend if I keep away from people and even if I am with people I hold them at arm's length. But the fear of being abandoned is so powerful and its starting to yet again have a stronghold on my life. Once again I have to work through the process of giving this fear over to God. Once again I have to work through the process of giving everything over to God. But this is hard. What if God lets me down. Yes, I know God won't let me down but this is so hard for me to grasp because sometimes I view God like I view my Dad. The past couple weeks I have been fighting myself. One part of me wants to keep building walls but the other part of me wants to tear down the walls that have been making their way around my heart again. This week someone reminded me that forgiveness is a process. Today his words really sank in. Not only is forgiveness a process but trusting and giving things over to God is a process. I will probably for the rest of my life struggle with tearing down walls. I will always struggle with the fear of rejection and abandonment. But its a process. And I hope that this process will get easier. But right now this process is hard. Especially with the holidays coming up. But I will keep on fighting. And slowly the arms length that I hold on people will become shorter. And even though the fear of abandonment and hurt will always be a part of my life, one day it will become easier and easier to overcome as the process goes on. So continue to pray for me since my battles are not and never will be over with. And I will start to play the game of life not so safely.
Tonight I knelt at the altar and I surrendered. I surrendered my dreams. I don't understand why God wants me to do what He does. I feel incapable of conquering the challenge He has set in front of me. I don't feel strong enough to run the race. Tonight when I knelt at the altar I learned I have to do what God is calling me to do no matter how alone I will feel and no matter what people will say of me. Surrendering that was the hardest part! And then a brother came up to me and he told me he doesn't know me but he noticed me the past two nights and he senses that God is doing something in my life. He just wants to tell me to go and do it! I didn't know what to say at first. How did he know I needed to hear those words? Everything he said I shouldn't worry about was something I was worrying about. Then him and a friend prayed over me. This brother has no idea how much he hit everything just perfectly. But there is one person who knew I need to hear those words. That one person is the Almighty Father. The Ruler of All. Even though my dreams look impossible and the dreams God has for me look impossible I know that with God I can accomplish them and I can't wait to see where God leads me!
Tonight I watched a movie about a young man who was a strong christian. He started dating a girl who wasn't a christian and she wanted to take him to parties and do things that we as Christians do not believe in but because he was such a strong christian he didn't give into the temptation. It started to amaze me how he never gave up no matter how odd he looked to the rest of the world. I was so glad I watched this movie because I have been been struggling with why I have to be the one with such a strong conviction for some things. It often feels like I'm alone and don't belong anywhere because of the things I believe are right and wrong. Sometimes I am scared I will be alone forever in this world. I'm scared that if I live in my town for the rest of my life I will never be accepted. But in the end of the movie the young man won over hearts to the Lord. In the end he was accepted for who he was. It amazed me how in the end it all panned out. Then a thought struck me. One day someone will accept me for who I am. One day someone will look at me and say thank-you for being you! Guys I can't wait to hear those words! I am so excited for the day where I will belong somewhere perfectly and be loved for who I am. Until then I guess I will have to wait patiently. In the mean time I am going to encourage people to be who they are. I want to bless people who have made an impact on my life. In order to be accepted and loved I also have to allow others to feel accepted and loved.
Today I have a strange feeling! I feel joy and sadness all at the same time. This weekend I was at my LBS reunion. I was not sure what to expect for the weekend. I didn't know how some things would work out. There were so many things I wanted to happen to me at the reunion but none of them happened. Yet I am happy. I am happy because a year ago I would have been depressed because my weekend didn't go how I wanted it to. I would have been miserable the whole weekend because nothing went how I thought it should. But I didn't become depressed. Instead I am happy! I put myself out there and enjoyed my weekend even though I wanted it to go a bit differently. I guess I am happy because this weekend I realized that I have overcome. I have overcome controlling. I am ready to let God do His work. I realized I can have a way better time if God is in control. Things don't always need to be my way. I am glad I wasn't in control this weekend because I like how things turned out!
Mondays are suppose to be bad, right? Well my Monday has been amazing! I have been struggling with the question if I should keep on writing my blog. I have gotten so many wonderful comments about my blog but at the same time hurtful words have been shared. The last thing I want to do with my blog is hurt people. My desire for my blog is to reach the lost and the hurting. My mission on this Earth is to help those who are hurting. I want to take my hurtful life story and turn it into a beautiful story to help others. This morning I walked into work and one of the guys I work with told me he wants to talk to me before I open the store. He began to tell me how he read my blog and how blessed he was. He told me he can relate with me. He told me that we go through hard things but we can then embrace those hard times and turn them into something wonderful. How true is that? God allows us to go through hard times but He also allows us to take those hard times and turn them into a beautiful picture.This morning I realized Satan has been attacking me. He has been using friends and family as his tools of attacking me. I was thinking that in order to resolve some issues I might have to shut down my blog. But then I realized that would be allowing Satan to win. That is the last thing I want to do! I want to do what God wants me to do. So I will continue to write about my story. I like to look at myself as God's tool. I am God's tool! How amazing is that. How amazing is it that my Creator chose me to be His tool? Little, old, normal, everyday person me? Wow! Because I am God's tool, I will not be ashamed of my story! I will not be ashamed to tell people all the hurt I have experienced and am experiencing! Six years ago God let the unthinkable happen to me and my family. But six years later God lets me share my story to bring Him honor and glory. If I wouldn't have forgiven my father, I would not be sharing my story. I wouldn't be able to talk about him at all. I wouldn't be the person I am right now. I know I have forgiven and I know that God is now going to allow me to use my story of forgiveness for the rest of my life. Today when I was talking with the guy at work a man walked into our store and he was a pastor at a local church. Before I knew I knew what was happening he was praying for me. He prayed that God would give me the words for my blog. It was then that I realized that I need to keep writing my blog. So my morning has been quite exciting. Today I can thank God for allowing my father to leave. Today I thank God for forgiveness. Today I am excited to share my story because I can't wait to help someone work through something hard and to help them forgive! My God never leaves my side!
Well, I have not posted anything in a couple weeks and too be honest I'm not sure what to post. Life has been a little hard the last while but at the same time its also been good. The feelings of not fitting in anywhere have entered every corner of my heart. I have come to a point where I am so scared if I go hang out with people I will experience that feeling of not being wanted. This fear has caused me to hide in my room weekends and to put walls up around my heart. This fear is wrong! I want to be the person that is a friend to all and puts herself out there hangs out with whoever. But at the same time that's hard. I remember a few years ago when I had one group to hang out with every weekend. I remember the feeling of being wanted. Its hard for me to be happy with where I am at today when I look back on the past and remember how easy those times were. Then I remember that we are not called to look on the past nor to look into the future but to look on today and live for what we have now. So today I want to stop focusing on the past but remember what I have today. Every time the feeling of not fitting in anywhere enters my heart I want to remember that I do fit in somewhere. I fit in my Savior's arms. I fit in my family. Most of all I fit in at the hospital and that is where God is calling me. Yes, a couple years ago I fit in with a group of friends, but today I fit in at the hospital and that brings me so much more happiness and fulfillment.
I shivered as the cold crushed its way against my bones. "What am I doing here?" "Why am I alone?" I open my eyes expecting to see walls all around but instead when I pushed open my eyes I saw color. I saw people. I was standing in a circle with people my age. The room wasn't dark at all. In fact it wasn't a room. I was outside experiencing a scenery that normally brought smiles to the faces of people. Yet, here I was at this place that brought friends together with smiles but I felt alone. How could I feel alone with so many people around me. People that were my friends. Then it hit me. I didn't belong here. I wasn't excepted here. Where do I belong? Where am I wanted? I felt eyes upon me. I looked around until I found those eyes of love. He wanted me! I ran towards Him, pushing people aside and forgetting about whatever was keeping me from Him. All I wanted was Him. I was tired of feeling alone in a crowd of people. As I finally reached Him, He wrapped His arms around me and looked into my big eyes of dismay and said, " Daughter, do not fear. You are not alone for I ,your God, am with you." As He said those words tears of hurt and rejection ran down my flushed cheeks. He squeezed me against Himself and then He cried with me. Through my sobbing I asked Him why I had to feel alone all the time. He would just holder me closer and cry even harder. When the tears had subsided, He knelt down and wiped the moisture from my cheeks. He looked me in the eyes and said, " Sami, always remember that you are never alone. I am always right beside you! One day this feeling will go away. But for right now I just need you to feel wanted by me. I want you to want me! Once you truly want me, the things people say won't bother you. The feeling of being lonely won't bother you because you will have me. And I will be all you care about. So Sami, want me with all you have and the rest will fall into place." When I opened my eyes I was in a big, dark, cold room all by myself. But I felt warm and I didn't feel alone. Through the darkness a gentle voice came. "Sami, you wanted me!"
Today I started studying for my ACT test and the only thought running about my mind is " God, I can't do this! I can't make it through nursing school! I'm not smart enough. Why did You give me a desire to be a nurse?" Today I am scared. Today fear has crept into my heart and invaded every last available space of my heart. Why do I have to want to be a nurse? Why can't I just want to be a cashier for the rest of my life? Being a nurse has been one of my dreams since I was six. I wanted to be like nurse Tim. Who is nurse Tim? Well let me tell you a story. A couple weeks after my sixth birthday I became sick with what appeared to be the flue. I was laying on the couch when all of a sudden I lost all eyesight. I was completely blind. Soon after I lost my eyesight I lost all consciousness. My grandparents came and picked up my mom and I and headed for the hospital. At the hospital they diagnosed me with spinal meningitis. I was rushed to Akron Children's where my dad met us and mom and dad sat there praying that I would make it through the night. People every where were praying for my life to be spared. I woke up the next morning and the doctors called it a miracle! I was in the hospital for a week. That week was hard. I hated IV's and I hated being stuck in my bed. During the night I would see men coming out of the ceiling and chase me. My eyes would also play tricks on me during the day. I had this elephant that had a hat on its head. Well when I looked at it I would see an elephant without a hat. I would get so angry because someone took the hat off my elephant. Mom would tell me over and over that the hat was still on the elephant. This was all side effects of my illness. The doctor told us that often people don't live when they have the meningitis and if they do they are normally blind, deaf, or paralyzed. So my eyes playing tricks on me seemed like a good side affect after we heard that news.
This morning there is something very heavy on my heart. Often when I think of labels I think of labels on food. But did you know labels are put on people too? Did you know you are the one that puts labels on people? How often do we sit somewhere and think, " They must be messed up because they have tattoos all over them."? Or "I bet she has major issues because her Mom died or her father left them." This label thing is horrible. We can't label people because of their past or because of how they look. You have no idea what they have been through. They don't need you to label them. They need you to show them love. They need you to just be their friend. Another thing I really struggle with is gossiping. I struggle with gossiping about people myself so this blog is just as much for me as it is for you. There was a time where I was hurt so much by what people were saying but my mom would stop me and look at me and tell me, " Sami, the truth will come out. Just be quiet and wait." You know what, she was right! The best thing to do is just be quiet. But it saddens me to see how people sit around and run each other down. What hurts the most is when you have to see your best friend or your own mother being hurt by friends or even their own family! It saddens me most when its their own family. All people have to do is go up to the person and ask them if its true. But that's not how us humans handle it. Instead we ignore the person and assume the worst. It just really hurts me to watch families lose each other because of gossip. To me family is the most important thing after God. They are the ones that help you through hard times so why run them down and talk about them. My one friend was lately hurt by what people were saying about her. She told me all people have to do is ask me if its true or not and I will tell them. How true is that? If we would just go to the person right away we could save allot of people deep hurt. But that friend is truly amazing. Even though people have truly hurt her she keeps talking to them. She keeps being their friend. She doesn't gossip about them because she didn't like when people did it to her. People, that is how we need to be. We need to do unto others what we want them to do unto us. We need to consider the person's feelings when we talk about them. In the end you are only hurting yourself by talking about others. I guess I just really want to see the world love each other instead of tearing each other down. We need each other.
Ever meet a person that has to be in control all the time? Well if you met me about two years ago then you did meet a controlling person. I had to be in control of everything! If a group of us would go away we would have to leave on the time I said. If we were late I would totally freak out! That is how bad of a control freak I was. Everything had to be just right. When I was 16 I found myself in a relationship. Oh that poor guy! Right at first everything was good. Soon my control issues started showing. If he didn't do something how I figured he would I would throw a fit. He pretty much had to walk on water. On top of me trying to control him I also smothered him. I had to know what he was doing at all times. I would get all upset every time we said goodbye in the evenings. I was so scared he would leave or something would happen to him. Well because of my controlling and the way I smothered him so much, he did leave. And did I take that hard. I thought life would never be great again. Even though he broke up with me, I kept texting him. Looking back I'm very embarrassed at how I responded to certain situations. Eventually I did move on with life. Even though life was different and I lost people due to the breakup, life was good. I will never forget the one evening I was sitting at a stop light and I was asking God if I will always be alone. All of a sudden I felt God tell me something exciting was going to happen to me! I got all excited and I had no idea why. Well a couple weeks later I got asked out! I prayed about it and I felt God was telling me to go ahead with it. I hadn't really struggled too much with my control issue so I thought maybe I was over it. Well I started dating and I was happy again. I felt myself falling for him and that made me even more happy. The best part was he treated me so well! Oh everything was going so good. I met his family and I loved them. I was so sure this was gonna be my family. I couldn't imagine being with anyone else. Well soon those control issues came back. And once again, poor poor guy! When he didn't do things the way I thought he should I would throw a fit. I acted like a brat! Well one night he told me something that changed my life forever. I was arguing about something. To be honest it was something very ridiculous! Poor guy didn't even know what he did wrong! Well we were driving down this road and I remember exactly where we were and what I was looking at when he looked at me and said "Sam, you have a serious problem and you need to get help and work through it." Well at that moment I just wanted to slap him because I knew it was true. Well time went on and we ended up on a break. While we were on a break I went to a counselor. She told me I was holding on to life with tightly clenched fists. She told me I need to go home and pray a prayer where I vision my life floating over to God. Well I decided I better try because I don't have to much more to lose. I remember standing in the shower with tightly clenched fists, tears flowing down my face, and crying out to God and telling Him I'm ready to give it all over to Him. When I went to open my fists, I couldn't. I could not open my hands! Then I felt something incredible. I felt someone pry open my hands and I saw my life float over into God's hands. After that night my life changed! Yes, the guy I loved ended up breaking up with me, but unlike before I was okay. Every time I thought of him again I would close my eyes and see him float over to God. To this day I still do this prayer. Every time I want to be in control of my life, I close my eyes and imagine everything floating over to God. When I looked back I didn't understand why God would tell me to date that young man if He saw it wasn't going to work and I was going to have to deal with more hurts. But now it all makes sense. If I wouldn't have dated him I probably would never have overcome my control issues. God's ways are not our ways but they sure are perfect.
Well today I am going to write about how I came to forgive my Dad. The week after my last visit with my dad, I went to camp out in Indiana. Little did I know what would happen that week to me. I had no idea what a life changing decision I would make. I went to camp with the same mind set I did every year. Of course this time I knew it was my last time going. During the day we had some bible classes and then lots of games and activities. In the evening we would assemble together and listen to the speaker. To be honest I don't remember any of the messages. All I remember is my heart being heavy and knowing that something was wrong and God wanted me to do something. By the end of the services I was always outside in tears. People would come to pray with me and they would want to know whats wrong and my answer was always, "I don't know." Deep down I knew it had something to do with my dad. One night my counselor was telling us her story and then she told us she would be out on the porch if anyone wanted to talk to her. I knew what I wanted to tell her. When I got out to the porch I just froze up. I sat there and said nothing. She looked at me and told me she wants me to talk to the leaders of the camp because she thinks I need to forgive my dad. My first instinct was to look at her and say no way! In my mind I was saying there is no way your gonna get me in a room with the leaders. The next day believe it or not she got me in a room with the leaders. And let me tell you, I was one nervous lady! I had no idea what they were going to do with me. We sat down at this table and they started asking me questions. Once they were finished with the questions they said they wanted to say this prayer with me. One of the preachers would say a couple sentences and I would repeat them. Never have I ever prayed a prayer like I did that day! In the prayer they had me ask God to give me visions. And the visions I had were so real! First I asked God to show me my heart. The heart I saw was completely shattered into millions of pieces. I saw God take all the rejection, bitterness, anger, hate, hurt, and all the gross stuff out of my heart and chop it up with an ax and then He burned it. I saw God hold me in His lap like I was a little girl. I saw God hold my Mom and my brothers. Then I told God that I forgive my dad. In the end I asked God to show me my heart and the picture I saw changed my life forever. My heart was a complete and perfect heart! In the beginning of my prayer I told myself I am not going to cry. I don't cry in front of people, especially these people. Well we were barely into the prayer and the tears started falling! By the end when I saw my perfect heart I was sobbing. From that moment on my life was changed forever. Yes, forgiveness is a ongoing process but it starts with that first step. Once you do that first step the rest gets easier. I have had to forgive my dad again and again but its so much easier. Instead of being angry at him all the time, I'm normally only mad at him for like a day and then the love for him comes right back. Yes, the love I have for my dad is a bit different than the love most of the girls have for their father but I'm not angry anymore. When people ask me how I am okay with talking about my dad I tell them I forgave my dad and so now I can talk about him without hating him. Guys, if there is someone in your life you need to forgive, please do so! In the end you feel so good and you feel like God is truly living through you. Yes, I still cry myself to sleep some evenings and yes, I still get mad at my dad but it goes away in the morning! I can move on with my life because I have found forgiveness. I have overcame! God won! Let Him win in your life too!
In my next post I would like to share how I forgave my dad but for right now i want to talk about trust. Maybe some of you reading this won't be able to relate to having trust issues but that is awesome! But I want to write this for those of you who also struggle with trust. One evening after my my parents had a fight I asked Mom if dad was going to leave and she told me to ask him. Well I finally worked up enough courage and I asked him if he was going to leave us. He looked me right in the eyes and told me he would never leave our family. Well he broke that promise. I now have a hard time trusting people. To all the girls out there with trust issues, trust the man you fall in love with. Don't push him away like I did. You will end up losing him. When people become to close to me I start putting up walls and I hold them at arms length. When I was dating I would hold on to the poor guy so tight so he wouldn't leave and I started controlling him. I thought this would make so he wouldn't leave. In the end it was the reason why he did leave. When you don't trust people, they feel that. Your friends don't want to have a friend that doesn't trust them. A boyfriend doesn't want a girlfriend who doesn't trust him. People we need to learn to trust. If you start trusting in a person and they let you down, don't think its because you trusted them. People will let you down. Always remember that God will never let you down. I think that before we learn to trust people we need to learn to trust God. If we don't trust the One who will never let us down how can we trust people? I feel like I shouldn't talk about trust because I am still struggling with it. Trusting God is hard. Its hard for me to tell God that I trust Him because what if I don't like what he has in store for me. One of my good friends told me that he has to turn over his trusting issues to God everyday. Its a daily thing. So I have an exercise I want everyone to try including myself. For the rest of the week I want you guys to once a day or even more tell God you are trusting Him with your future. I truly believe if we learn to trust God trusting people will become easier. Lets tear down those wall around our heart and trust God to take care of our heart. In another post I would like to share how I am also slowly but surely overcoming my control issues. Hopefully this post made some sense. The main thing I wanted to get across is to trust God. Right now I need to trust God with my future. So those who feel alone with your trust issues, rest assured I am right there with you! Hope you all have a fantastic week:) Until next time......
After the divorce papers came many many court hearings. Mom felt that we weren't suppose to fight for our house so we didn't. We ended up losing our house and having to move. We had no clue where we were going to move to but I knew it would be okay and it was. We now rent a house and we have amazing landlords. Praise God! My dad ended up fighting for custody of us children. The court decided that we would have to go to my Dad's house every other Saturday. When this news reached my ears I felt trapped. I couldn't move! "Why God? Haven't we been through enough??" The night I heard this news I was on the phone with my best friend Stacy for a very long time. All I could do was cry. She was amazing through this difficult time. She would cry with me and just listen to me. Soon those dreaded Saturdays came. All of us children were always a mess the week we had to go see Dad. Saturday morning would dawn on us way too soon:( Before we went outside into Dad's vehicle, Mom would gather us in a circle and pray God's protection over us. This is the reason I believe we made it out of my Dad's house on some of those visits without being harmed. After Mom was finished praying we would go out and some of us would have to sit in the trunk of Dad's envoy because he didn't have enough seats for us. We would travel about two hours then we would be at Dad's house. Him and his girlfriend would try to have stuff for us to do. The day always seemed so much longer than normal. Once it was evening we would meet mom and one of the couples from church in town and then we would head home. We did this for a couple months. We kept praying something would happen that we wouldn't have to go again. One Saturday we we got ready to go see Dad again. We prayed just like we always did not knowing how important the prayer was for today and how much we would need it. Like usual Dad came and picked us up and we headed for his house. That Saturday Dad told us he remarried. That was only the start of that dreadful Saturday. Due to some people not wanting me to post what happened next I will not post it. All I will say is that day I ended up sitting outside in the lawn holding Tyler and sobbing for hours. Finally the day was over and we could go home. We kept praying we wouldn't have to go back! That visit ended up being our last visit. Dad called a couple Saturdays later and said he doesn't have enough money to come get us anymore so we stopped going. That visit affected my brothers and I in so many ways. But I believe that with God we can overcome it. This year at LBS I learned that with God we can overcome anything and with God I overcame this visit and I was free of it! Please continue to pray for my family. Thankyou:)
I laid there curled up in a ball in the closet that connected my room to my mom's room listening to my mom wailing. The only thoughts I had were, " why me God??", "when will this end??" Every time I cried out to God there was only silenced that followed my pleading. Where was He when my dad ran out? Where was He when my mom was crying? Why wasn't He helping me?? I was so frustrated with God! But to this day I still don't know why God let it happen to my family but I do know where He was when my Dad left or when my Mom was crying. My God was standing right beside us holding us and crying along with us. He was holding my hand while I laid there in my closet! I spent many nights in the closet listening to my mom. Looking back I can't believe I actually made it through that. It seemed to hopeless back then. I was scared I would never get my smiling and laughing mom back. It took a very long time but praise God I did get her back.
The weeks after my dad left were really hard and full tears being shed. Around a month or two later my Dad had to come back for my great grandmas funeral. He started talking like he was gonna move back home. He said he was gonna go on another truck run and then he would be back and probably move back in. But he never did come back home. I do not know exactly what all the dates are for these events but one day we stopped in at the post office to get the mail but what we didn't know was that there were papers in there that would change out lives even more. I will never forget the gut wrenching sounds my mom made when she got in the van with that big yellow envelope. Inside were divorce papers. When we got home mom wouldn't get out of our vehicle. Once she finally had enough energy she got out and went up to her room and started wailing loud gut wrenching cries. Soon preachers and family were at our house holding each other and crying out to God. This evening is engraved in my mind forever. I thought I would never see my mom smile again and my family would never be normal again. "God, it can't get worse, can it?" What I didn't know is that it actually could get worse. But I will save that for later. Please keep my family in your prayers. We still have lots of struggles and tears but we do continue to march on with God holding our hands.
About five years ago on a Saturday evening I was helping my mom wash the dishes. Like normal we started talking and soon she started crying and she told me that my dad didn't want to go to church with us anymore. The news slammed into my gut and it left a stinging sensation.But in a way I knew it was coming. My parents had had problems for as long as I can remember. I would often hear them yelling at each other in the basement. But still the news hurt. I honestly do not remember the rest of the evening. All I remember is the next morning. That morning is the morning my life changed forever.
I woke up to my brother coming in the room and telling me to wake up because Dad left. All I replied was " Who cares!" All I wanted to do is lay in bed and not get out. I finally got out of bed and went downstairs. When I got downstairs I saw my mom and my four little brothers all sitting on the couch crying. And that is what we did the rest of the day. We held each other and cried and people came over and cried with us too. This is only the beginning of my story of rejection and hurt. But as of now this is all that I'll write. I do want to share the rest of my story throughout the rest of the year. Hopefully I will be able to speak words of encouragement to all of you:)
