my testimony part 7

 Shortly after my life-changing breakup with “Bill”,  I attended at a youth retreat. Some kids were there who weren’t with my youth group. One girl was praying at the altar and the Lord pressed on me to ask her if she was saved. She said she was so I prayed with her. 

Later a group of about ten women attacked me with one as their leader, yelling at me, telling me I had no right to ask that girl if she was saved. 

Shocked, I said I needed to make sure she knew the Lord first, isn’t that the most important thing?

The one who was leading the group hissed  “You may have led her to doubt her salvation!”

I quit working with my youth group shortly after that. I was very confused and disillusioned. I didn’t want to hurt anyone. I had thought I’d heard the Holy Spirit telling me to ask. What if I hadn’t? What if I was wrong? 

I have since learned that even though the Bible says we should examine ourselves to make sure we’re in the faith, that most Christians want you to do anything but that. 

They want you to be assured of your salvation, even when perhaps you shouldn’t be - like when you’re living in gross sin such as living together outside of marriage - which the Bible says will send you to hell if you don’t repent. (see Galatians 5, 1 cor 10, and more) Among other things such as gossip. And lying. So please don’t think I’m picking on people who are cohabiting. If you don’t like it take it up with God. They aren’t my rules. 

After that heartbreak, I met a Preachers Kid online, when meeting people online was new. It was 1997. 

He was a Methodist (gasp!). I’d been taught not to date kids outside of my denomination (which is wrong by the way), but since he was a PK he was actually a lot more Christlike than most of the kids in my youth group. He was very nice, soft spoken, really knew his bible and ADORED me. (more on this later). 

I prayed about him but got no answer, because I still wasn’t walking with The Lord like I should have been, and after a decent amount of time, I married him. I always felt like it wasn’t quite right even from the very beginning. But I was on the rebound and didn’t understand how that can contribute to poor decisions. 

I did try to break up with him for a month and I didn’t miss him at all. I told him to give me a month, and a month to the day later he called me, crying about how much he needed me. This should have been a clue. But I felt sorry for him and got back together. 

I tried praying about this young man and didn’t hear any answer, and I told God if I didn’t hear from Him, I was going to go ahead and marry this guy. 

Needless to say God never answered. I have since learned that if God doesn’t answer, DON’T go ahead and do it anyway, whatever it is but especially, MARRIAGE! 

I also learned that God has someone planned out for you. Please don’t listen to the people who say He doesn’t and it’s a matter of free will. They’re wrong. God has someone. Hold out for them. Ask Him to get rid of anyone who isn’t the one from Him. And WAIT for them! Remember Rebekah and Isaac and the camels! 

But I of course didn’t do those things back then. 

I married this guy, who reminded me of Charlie Brown. So I’ll call him Charlie. We got married in the church I grew up in and moved about an hour away which made it difficult to attend church there, but it was where we could afford. 

On my honeymoon I had a brush with an angel. 

We were on St. John’s in the Caribbean, my parents having gifted us with an amazing honeymoon. While there we spent a day in the sun. Being fair skinned, amd coming from Philadelphia, I didn’t realize it but I was having symptoms of heat stroke. 

I sat on a bench feeling like I was going to pass out. “Charlie” said he was running to get help, but then I felt his hand on my shoulder, very clearly, warm and strong.  I sat with my face in my hands, concentrating on not passing out. The hand on my shoulder helped me. 

I don’t know how long it was but it was a little while, at least 15 minutes I think, when two EMTs approached me and gave me some gatorade and explained I needed electrolytes and said I would be ok. 

After they left I asked my husband - were they just passing by? he looked at me weirdly. No, he said, I told you I was going to get them. 

I realized then I’d literally been touched by an angel. 

—————-

Eventually  we came home from our vacation and settled in a small apartment. because we were an hour from my church now we began attending at a closer church. 

 No one called from my church, I never heard from anyone, which wounded me. I had thought those people were my close friends. But I was wrong.

 Actually I didn’t understand yet about true and false believers. I know now many of them were  Pharisees and tares - false believers.  I still pray for many of them. I’m not pointing Fingers here - I was one of them for a long time. 

 So I began attending a

Methodist church with my new husband. It was a breath of fresh air after the high expectations and legalism of the Church I had grown up in. I took classes and became a member there. 

Meanwhile I'd been working in nursing homes as an activities director, and me and my husband decided we wanted to "do something for God." 

So We got a job at a group home for troubled teenaged girls. We moved in and that became our life for two years.  

     I owe a lot to that group home, where I was trained to become a parent, learned how to set limits, and saw an example that was different than my own parents', especially in the area of working out conflict.

  I have no doubt God led me there. The model they taught us was “restorative practices,” and that’s how I believe God operates. It’s biblical. He is the God who restores. (Acts 3:19-21,

1 Peter 5:10, Joel 2:25-26, Psalm 51:12)

Working at the group home, Community Service Foundation, helped me to come to a better understanding of God as a Good Father who loves his children. Even though He sometimes must rebuke us, it’s always done in love. 

 “Charlie” and I fostered 36 girls over the course of two years. I first started drawing caricatures on the weekends when I was working there. 

I loved my foster girls and it was a great job I have always been grateful for. 

     The week after September 11th 2001 happened, which I will never forget, 

I found out I was having a baby. It was a bright moment in a very dark time. 

     I loved that job so much they had to make me leave, and I'm glad I did because my first child, Grace, who is now 19, was born unexpectedly with Down's Syndrome and a severe heart defect.

more about this in the next segment.