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There is something in the human spirit that causes each of us to hunger for something more. Across the world and through the ages, mankind has looked outward and upward for a deeper meaning to life, something that shows us that we are not alone. There is an empty space inside each person that yearns to be filled. We all know the feeling of being lonely even in the middle of the crowd. We want something real to believe in.

There are so many paths to take looking for meaning. Some of us fill it with things of the world. Whether it is a relationship (or many brief flings), money, possessions or whatever, none of these fill that spot. Having attained whatever it is a person desires, they then turn to looking for something new.

Others numb themselves to the speaking of their spirit. Drugs, alcohol, work or even a hobby that consumes their time and drowns out their desire for more. However, when the drugs dry up and the alcohol leaves them jittery, when the job is lost or the hobby turns cold, they are right back looking for the way to fill the emptiness inside.

There are still others who want to deny this need for deeper meaning. They want to say there is nothing more. That everything that is is in the here and now. They deny that they have a spirit, merely a physical body and a brain.

Even through their denial, they are actively trying to drown out their spiritual needs. They look to the heavens to look into the past. They want to see the beginning of it all for themselves but will not admit there was a creator. They are looking for a beginning that never existed as it appears in their minds.

Finally, there are those who look for spiritual meaning. They can look here and there, following the trend of the moment. They can look for a god that has history. They can find spiritual meaning in their inner self. They can believe in many gods and the ability to be reincarnated to come back and live life over and over again.

With these religions, the individual has to gain right standing with their good works – whether it be physical deeds, monetary gifts or even the society in which you were born. The problem is that the empty spot is still empty. None of this will ever fill that space.

I have seen these scenarios play out time and time again. I have been on several of these false paths. Loved ones have been on others. You will search and seek and, for a time, think you have found the answer. Then you realize it was all a house of cards and then you move on, searching once again.

For me, I realized that all of it was worthless. There was nothing I could do to wipe away my past. It was there in front of my eyes and mind day in and day out. It was as if I carried the weight of my sins as a burden throughout the day. I couldn’t share how I felt and the things that I had done because I knew others would turn away from me in revulsion. Worse still, others would encourage me in my path of self-destruction.

I needed help.

I found that help. I found forgiveness. I found redemption. I found purpose. I found Someone who loved me no matter what I had done. I found Someone who would help me going forward.

I called out to God and asked, “If you are really God, then show me, give me something to believe in. I want to lay my burdens down and have someone to help me.” He never fails to answer this plea and He led me to my answers right in my living room. For me, it was as simple as turning on the television to a Christian channel.

Once I accepted Jesus, I found that the He fit that empty space inside. He also brought the Holy Spirit to dwell inside me. He’s there in good times and He’s there in bad times. He’s there whenever I need help. He’s there when I have strayed off course and want to find my way back again.

It’s been decades since I accepted Jesus Christ as my Savior. Unlike the false answers that don’t satisfy and leave you wanting more, Jesus has been, is, and will always be the answer to my soul’s search. I have never felt the need for anything else.

I have doubts from time to time as all Christians do (whether they admit it or not.) When I am in the midst of that, I ask God to give me a renewed spirit, to quiet my doubts and to give me assurance. He never fails to answer this prayer.

When troubles arise, I can cry out like the psalmist and ask God to help me. To carry me through the crisis and defeat the threat against me. That doesn’t mean that God gives me everything I ask for. He knows what is right and perfect for me to have. He also knows that in times of crisis and challenge, my faith grows stronger and deeper.

God is the piece that is missing from our souls. Since the fall of Adam and Eve, we have been born with a dead spirit. Prior to that, man communed with God on a spiritual basis. He was their creator and their father. When they sinned, by breaking the one rule God had given them, their spiritual connection to Him was broken forever.

As mankind could never repair the breach that sin had placed between the perfection of God and sin nature of man, God had to step in to repair it himself. God is made up of a trinity, wholly separate and still are one God. The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

Because God loved mankind so much and wanted to have communion with His creation once again, God (the Father) sent his Son (Jesus), to be born of a woman and to live life as we all do. He was tempted as we are. He felt joy and sadness, just as we do. The difference was that while Jesus was entirely man, He was also entirely God at the same time. He didn’t fall into the temptations that each of us do. He lived a life without sin. That made Him the perfect and blameless sacrifice. The only sacrifice that could and would forever heal the breach between God and man.

When Jesus died, He took on the sins of everyone. Those who lived before and since. He hung on the cross while God rained down on Him the wrath punishment of all mankind’s sins. For the first time in his life, the connection between Jesus (the Son) and God (the Father) was broken. It was that loss of connection that caused Jesus to cry out to ask God why He had forsaken him.

Once He had taken the full measure of punishment for our sins, He then said “It is done” and willingly died. While He had been put to death by men, dying was His choice. He could have stopped it all with one word. But then the breach would forever be left between mankind and God. He had to die to heal the connection between God and man. He died for our sins but then, as the only man to have lived a sinless life, He rose again three days later because having lived sinless, death had no hold on him. In doing so, He not only healed the breach but also gave mankind a way to eternal life.

He has the gift of grace to offer. He wants nothing in return – no promises, no actions, no good works will pay for this gift. He gives you a free gift of forgiveness for all of your sins, past and future and assure you of eternal life with Him. All you have to do is accept it and Jesus as your Savior and make Him Lord of your life. Ask Him to guide you and let others know of what He has done for you.

If you do so, you will be born again with a new spirit. One that is connected to God as it was originally meant to be. Your search will be over. The emptiness will be gone. You will never be alone again.

1 John 4:15 If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God, God lives in them and they in God.

I’m a hard person to live with. I like to organize and plan for what will happen in the future. Not so much a worrier as much as wanting to be prepared for what is coming. I euphemistically call myself a problem solver. The truth is I like to consider all details so I won’t be blindsided when events happen.

Does it work? I’ve recently come to the conclusion that it does not. The things that happen in real life are infinitely more tragic, messy, funny, and joyous than I could imagine. There is no way to factor life’s events in your head. Who knows what will give you the moment of happiness or sorrow in your life?

True enough, events like losing my son to cancer, are things that you know will hurt. What you don’t know is that a life event like this will break your heart into so many pieces that, like Humpty Dumpty, nothing can ever put it together again. Until I am in heaven with my family reunited, there will always be an essential piece of my life and heart missing.

For the longest time after my son passed away, I let my broken heart have sway in my life. I was like a jigsaw puzzle that could not be finished – pretty much useless. I filled my life with busy work so that I would not have to think about how my life was to be without one of my children.

The busy work started to become my life. As I would finish with one avenue, I would begin a second one. Pretty soon, my behavior became not only obsessive but actually controlled and became my life. While I had always gone headlong into new ventures and hobbies, it went into overdrive. I would center around one business or hobby and then move to another. Each time, the new hobby et al would make me happy and then, again, each time it would become a mere accumulation of stuff and dissatisfaction until I found the next area to immerse myself into.

In the meantime, quite a bit of the remainders of the previous obsessions started to accumulate. Not hoarder status but certainly more than anyone should keep in their lives. When it added to the leftover stock from my internet business, the bulk became unwieldy. We moved into a bigger house twice because those were the homes we found that we liked. However, it also allowed me to store my stuff and still move to another hobby.

Then came the Amazon Vine offer. This is a program that Amazon has which allows invited individuals to choose certain items (from a list that Amazon provides) to use and to review (on Amazon.) While these items are noted as free, the truth is reviewers pay income taxes on them so the products become the wages for the work of the reviewer.

I almost threw the offer away thinking it was a scam but instead, I joined. That was seven years ago. Reviewing became my new hobby. I not only took the items from Vine but also started making the bulk of my purchases through Amazon so that I could also review them.

My reviewing hobby suddenly became much more than that. It started to control not only me but also my husband. When I started climbing the ranks of reviewers, I was shocked, mainly because I didn’t know that reviewers had ranks. I had found my niche of reviews and used those to climb to their #1 reviewer status.

This turned out to be anti-climatic. All the work that went into this endeavor was shown to be an utter waste of time. There I was, at the pinnacle, and nothing real to show for it. Worse still, even though I had attained this high rank, I felt like I still needed to work to maintain it. Something I never wanted and was surprised by, something that meant nothing at all, suddenly became even more of a chore than any hobby had been before.

While I actually enjoying using the hobby items I purchased and I also enjoyed the writing of those reviews, it was the effort of putting those reviews on Amazon that took my time and was a source of great unhappiness in my life. I knew that my reviews were helpful as many individuals told me so. I also knew that I had accumulated at least three individuals who made it their lives work to tear me apart.

So I continued unabated.

In the meantime, my health was deteriorating for a variety of reasons – none of which had anything to do with my obsession turned addiction. However, staying home and at my computer also took its toll on my health and made the other conditions worse. I got to the point where there were only a handful of items I could eat without becoming violently ill. That went on for a number of years. I became weaker and suffered from malnutrition.

About a year ago, a doctor finally listened to what I was saying about what was wrong with me. She ordered tests and we found my diagnosis and treatment was two simple pills a day. With that change, I was suddenly able to eat more foods. I also had a long awaited surgery that made it easier for me to lift and carry items.

My mindset was starting to change along with my health. When, a few months later, Amazon dropped a tenth of their reviewers in the Vine program, I was one of them. When I asked my husband how he felt about it, he said okay. He asked me how I felt and all I could say was “Thank, God, it’s over.”

Well, it wasn’t quite over. I still continued to buy my hobby items and to review them. However, it was with less intensity. It still took an enormous amount of time and effort – mostly due to the bugs in the Amazon review system that took putting in a written review, video and photos a four day long ordeal. That was in addition to actually using and testing the product, coming to a conclusion about it and finally writing the review.

Worse still, I had somehow come to care about how this unwieldy system worked. I would write recommendations to Amazon’s executive staff. Some of which they used, some they did not. Yet another effort that took up much of my time. Not to mention that I was providing hours and hours of free work per week to a half-trillion dollar company.

It was at this point that I became very ill and was hospitalized. For nine days, I could have cared less about what had seemed so important before. When I got home from the hospital, I took a break but then wrote a few reviews. I had the same problems and it took much too much of my time.

It was around this time that God told me to stop putting my hobby reviews on Amazon. I could continue my blog and vlog but Amazon, for those items, was not allowed for a season.

I stepped back and put my effort into working on my improving my health and, too, into writing for this blog.

Then I heard a sermon about false idols and false gods. I learned that all sorts of things can be your false god. I was challenged to look at my life and look to see where my time, effort, thoughts and money were being placed. At that moment, I realized that I had created my false god in Amazon.

Once I understood that, I was able to put it behind me and drop all cares and concerns about things that were not real in life. To turn my back on the false god that I made with my own hands as surely as the Israelites had made their golden calf in the wilderness.

Instead, I am now looking at what is good and true and real. That is the love of Jesus Christ as my savior, the Holy Spirit as my guidance counselor and my Father, the Lord, as He provides for me all that is right and just and perfect.

With the help of God, I have left behind the addictions of the past. That is not only the reviewing habit but also the obsessive behavior I had indulged in since my son’s death. We are enjoying giving away what we can and also enjoying throwing away that which we cannot. Our lives are becoming both freer and richer with each less belonging that we have.

I understand now why Jesus challenged the young rich man to give up his possessions. The things of the world will tie you down and distract you when what you need to do is to move forward and to love and follow and worship God. For me, that means to stop trying to plan my life but instead to let God take care of me and do as He asks of me.

John 4:21-24 “Woman,” Jesus replied, “believe me, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know; we worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and in truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in the Spirit and in truth.”

Learning to forgive others for the wrongs that they have done to you, or especially, to those you love, is difficult. It doesn’t seem to come easy. It goes against the fiber of human nature.

I know that I have had this problem in the past and still fight against it to this day. I could give you a list of some of the wrongs that have been done to me. I could give you a much more extensive list of the hurts, slights, and down right bad things that have been done to my children. I used to jokingly say, you can do whatever (fill in the blank) to me and I will be okay with it, but if you do it to one of mine, I will come after you.

I won’t give you the long list, but I will tell you about one incident that sticks and burns in my mind years later. It involved one of my children.

My eldest daughter was only in (Christian) preschool when I received a telephone call from someone who identified themselves as a local police officer. She told me that there was a report of sexual abuse at the preschool my daughter attended. She then asked to speak to my child. I was a little surprised because who would talk to a young child without the child’s parent being present on the phone? I refused but said I would be happy to come to the station with my daughter and we could all talk together.

I was right to do so as the woman then started spewing abusive sexual language into my ear about my daughter. I hung up shaking with rage. Yes, this was when you could slam a telephone down with anger and that was a very satisfying action!

I’ll never forget as that call came in on a Friday evening before a three day holiday weekend. The abuser had planned it perfectly. The problem in those days was, while I could and did report her to the police immediately, I could not call the telephone company to have her calls traced until Tuesday, the next business day.

The woman kept calling throughout the entire weekend. We let it go to answerphone (which was a micro cassette tape in those days.) The police had asked us to record the calls for evidence. All weekend long, she would call and say the most horrible things about my daughter and what deviant sexual acts she was going to do to her. Also things that proved that she actually did know my daughter which was the scariest part of it all.

Her last call was late Monday evening. She knew when to stop calling so as not to be traced. I had the cassettes which I took to the police on Tuesday. The telephone company put a trap on my line but told me there was nothing to be done unless she called again.

The police officers in my city took the matter very seriously. They told me it was common for men to behave this way but extremely unusual for women to do so. Also, because of the rarity, it generally meant it was personal and would be acted upon.

The mistake she made was that she didn’t just call my daughter and she mentioned my daughter’s preschool by name. She called several other children. Some parents actually let this perverted woman talk to their child. We all reported the crime.

The police stations in the various neighboring cities started working together and came up with a short time frame during which the children were in the same school, same class and at the same time. They also pinpointed a former employee who had had all of the children in her care for a period of two weeks before she was fired for other reasons. They were also able to figure out that she had not acted on her thoughts and words, at least not that time, as she had not been left alone with the children.

I was impressed with how quickly they found the woman and that they prosecuted her and she went to jail. Justice was swift and justice was served.

What I remember most about the episode was the rage that I felt. The strength of it made me physically shake. I have been angry before and since but nothing like the consuming fire of hatred I felt towards this woman. Frankly, I wanted to kill her. If I could have gotten my hands on her, I just might have done so. When I found out that she had done this to other children that I knew, it made me all the more enraged.

Even though I was and am a Christian, I buried the feelings down deep as an unforgiven wrong. Whenever I heard of sexual predator pedophiles, the memory would spring up and the same rage would fill me even though it has now been more than thirty years since it happened.

In going through our church’s stored past sermons, my husband and I heard and watched one recently about Grace. That it is undeserved forgiveness. The type that Jesus showed us when He died for us. He not only forgave us, He did so because He loved us – even while we were still sinning. He forgave us for all of our sins, including those against Him directly.

Jesus told us that doing a forbidden deed is a sin but also what is in our hearts and minds is as much a sin as a deed. Based on both deeds and thoughts, I’ve broken every one of the Ten Commandments. I’m guilty and my swift and sure justice should be death. And it was to be so, but then, Jesus volunteered to stand in my place and take my punishment. There’s nothing I can do to earn a pardon like that, all I can do is accept the sacrifice He gave me and thank Him forevermore for saving me from spiritual death.

The prayer that He left us with as an example of what we should pray for, the Lord’s Prayer, asks God to forgive us as we forgive others. He wants us to show others the same undeserved forgiveness that we were given.

A number of deeds I have had happen to me came to mind after hearing the sermon. I easily and wholeheartedly forgave those individuals responsible and I then put the pain behind me. I thought that was the end of it and went my way.

Each day since, something new has come to my mind and I worked through and did forgive those people. Just yesterday, I found out something that a dentist had done which almost certainly contributed to my current illness. Again, it was easy to say to God and to mean it – I forgive her.

When I sat down to write this today, I had no idea what my subject would be. I was a little concerned that I would have nothing to say. It was as if God took control of my hands and thoughts and wrote the paragraphs words for me.

Then as I typed, the whole episode regarding my daughter sprang into my mind and, for a moment, the rage burned again. I not only had to forgive the woman, I also had to ask God to forgive me for the murderous hate I still felt. While it went against every human (sin) nature that I have ever felt, I gave and asked for forgiveness. I know that He did forgive me as the rage went away and will never come back again.

I still feel sad that it all happened and am glad that my daughter had not personally faced any of it. But the weight of my sin is now gone. I can now pray for the woman involved to face her own sins and accept Jesus as her savior and turn from the evil ways she has been following. If she does so, she will become my sister in Christ. We will spend eternity together praising the One that saved us from our sins.

It’s time for us all to look inward and find those hurts and pain and rage. It is time to bring them to the Light of God’s love. He knows what has happened. He knows how hard it is. He also knows how light the burden will become once we forgive others as He has done for us. These old pains are some of the reasons we are being held back in our Christian walk. It is hard to pick up the cause of Jesus and walk His way when we are anchored in the past with pain and lack of forgiveness.

Ephesians 4:31-32 (NLT): Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words, and slander, as well as all types of evil behavior. Instead, be kind to each other, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, just as God through Christ has forgiven you.

I lived in Southern California for most of my life. In that environment, telling people you were a Christian, sharing the Gospel, or simply trying to live a Christian life, was tantamount to admitting you were not only different but also a bit of a freak.

However, there were still enclaves of Christians to be found. I found some at work, at my children’s schools, at social events. Some were even to be found at church. I say that only half jokingly. Many of the churches there were spiritually dead. Trying to sit through a service, I would fall asleep. I wanted to hear the Word of God and instead got lectures on good works and social equality.

After we moved to Texas, we found that talking about being a Christian is a different experience than doing so in California. People are more receptive to hearing you talk about Christ and what being a Christian means to you.

Because of that freedom, I found out that God had His hand of protection on me during my illness. Doctor after doctor, nurse after nurse told me that they were Christians as well. My surgeon told me he would pray for me. When I responded that I knew prayer worked, he told me that praying for healing worked, too, and that he would pray for that for me.

My physical therapist is also a Christian and that makes a big difference in what we discuss as far as my goals. I am thinking far ahead but we are working with the here and now. He understands my goals and how they work in my Christian life and is helping me to meet those goals. We’ve discussed prayer and healing as well.

It’s amazing how God protects His children in every detail. We have hired cleaners to take care of the house as I cannot do the work and my husband has all of his time taken up with his work and taking care of me as my full time caregiver. We were supposed to have one cleaning crew that my husband had met but instead a young man and a changing partner kept showing up. I liked the guy and would exchange pleasantries with him.

One day, he didn’t arrive and instead, a crew of two women showed up. They sprayed cinnamon scent in our master bath and bedroom that almost made me pass out. What my husband went through to get some of that scent out so I could sleep that night was hours and hours of work. After that, I told my husband I only wanted the young man to head our crew and my husband made sure that was the case.

The next time the crew showed up, the young man was there and told us he would always be part of the crew that came to our house. We got to talking and I mentioned that I was a Christian and he responded that he was too. No wonder I felt so safe with him taking care of our house.

When I was writing my blog post about finding our new church, I mentioned it to the young man. I told him the story of how God had tugged at my heart and how we finally found our way to it. He told me that he had goosebumps on his arms because he was pretty sure of what I would answer. He then asked me what church I was attending. When I told him Chase Oakes, he excitedly exclaimed, “Me, too. My wife and I go to that church.”

We’ve been able to talk every other week for a few minutes about what is going on at the church that my husband and I have never stepped foot in. It helps bring church home to me in a personal way that I have missed.

So, talking about Christ, meeting other Christians, and even finding and/or going to church can be hard or easy depending on where you are located. I’ve lived in an area where living my faith, expressing it, and raising my children as Christians was more often than not mocked and scorned. Now, I live in an area where it is easier and not unexpected to share your faith. In my case, God is bringing more Christians into my life and into my home than I have experienced when I could freely go anywhere I wanted to go.

I know that I am one of the few that are so blessed. It’s a sad comment on the time we live in that we can’t express our faith openly wherever we are. In some places, Christians are persecuted, tortured and even put to death for simply practicing their faith. While every generation has faced great persecution, this is the first time it has been global. It is also the first time we have been able to see, in real time, the daily persecution and trials of our fellow Christ followers all around the world.

In His mercy, God has given us a way to spread the Gospel to the whole world right from our own homes. He’s using the internet as a way for Christians to speak together no matter where they are located. He is using it as a place for unbelievers who are seeking to be able to read of the experiences of others who were just like them and who found salvation through the sacrifice and grace of Jesus Christ.

It’s also a spot where you can look for testimonies (like mine) and historical proof when your faith is being tested. You can find solace when and where you need it. You can find so many translations of the Bible at the touch of a finger so that you can hear the voice of God in the style or language you need. There are wonderful videos of modern and traditional worship music as well. Or, as in my case, you can find your church home through God’s use of streaming and Youtube videos.

While there is so much wrong with the world today and the internet is being used to perpetuate sick and twisted hate and evil, God has taken it and used it for the good. It’s a day when Christians can take a bold stance for Christ and to preach the Gospel that, essentially, places them in front of the whole world.

God has given us this tool and platform. The time is now. The place is here. Today not tomorrow. It is up to us to grasp it and use it to tell others of the redeeming and grace-filled love and the salvation power of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Matthew 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.

There’s nothing like being woken up at 3:42am. There’s really nothing like being woken up at 3:42am and being told by the Holy Spirit to pray for someone who has been vindictive and mean to you. Especially someone who has never met you and has created a fantasy persona about you on the Internet.

There are a number of individuals who heartily dislike me based on reviews I’ve written. They have been able to cull together a picture of me in their minds and that picture is based mostly on my love of God,my children and grandchildren as well as my enjoyment of reading and crafting. While there have been several such individuals, the most long standing is a lady I will refer to as G.

G. and I were both part of a reviewing program on a large internet store. On this store was a forum set up for people in the group (though it wasn’t limited to them and anyone could read and respond to the posts.) I rarely posted but once I had done so, this woman took offense at what I had to say.

Interestingly, all I had said was 1) my son passed away from leukemia at 18 and 2) my daughters were both strong young women who enjoyed the sciences and had overcome learning challenges to get to where they were. That one was a mechanical engineer and the other was getting her degree as a mathematics scientist. When other individuals on this forum empathized with me about my son, I responded by saying I would meet him in heaven one day.

I think it was this comment that burned into G. I knew nothing about her (though someone later exposed her personal information in an unkind manner.) From the moment of that particular post, G. has had a crusade against me where ever she posts, which is a dwindling number as forums, apparently, keep banning her from posting. When I moved to the top of this reviewing program’s list of high ranking reviewers, it apparently enraged G. beyond measure.

I don’t follow her around, but I did follow the reviewing group when the internet store recently dropped their forums. Sure enough, once again, G. was guaranteed to talk about me poorly whenever possible. Equally sure was that the authoritative statements she made about me were all false. What was funny was that she had no idea I was on this new forum, she was just trying to poison the group against me in general.

So, I guess one might understand that I didn’t feel too kindly about G. and her comments. They hurt and made me feel very badly both about G. and about myself. I never responded in a bad manner. When it first started, I invited her to have a reasonable discussion but that was no good. As I am not one to post on forums (certainly no more than a couple of handfuls in my life), I was able to ignore her and/or turn the other cheek easily. I was also pleased to see individuals who came to my defense.

So I was feeling very righteous and good about myself. That is until I heard a sermon which included a reference to loving and praying for your enemies. Well, three names came immediately to my mind (all from the internet store as it turns out) and I thought, seriously God, I have to pray for them? I am not responding to them, I’m not even thinking too badly of them. I have to love and pray for them as well?

I starting praying for them and especially G. She was sticking out for some reason. The other two were even more unpleasant to me and about me but one had suffered a traumatic brain injury in her twenties and the other was embroiled in both drug and satanic cultures. I could see that something outside of themselves was causing their issues.

G., on the other hand, had serious problems in her personal life. This became known when the other individual posted links to a newspaper article about G. being arrested and other information about her. I must admit that I read it. I was very sorry for her problems but I didn’t empathize with her. I had that lovely feeling you get when you want to say, what you reap is what you sow.

So, I prayed for these three and asked my husband to join me on occasion. However, it was always with my mind and intellect that I was responding, never with my emotions and heart. Kind of like when a child says they are sorry because their parent told them to do so. You know that it is just words and the child is not at all sorry for what they have done. So to, were my lip service prayers for these three.

Just last Sunday, which was Palm Sunday, a pastor at my church was preaching about God’s love for us. A love so great that He stepped down to earth, to live as a man among us. To endure the same temptations, scorn and abuse that we all have to deal with. And He, being fully God while at the same time fully man, was able to love those who treated Him so badly. He loved them so much, He was willing to step in and take their punishment for sin on His own body. He loved them even as they mocked Him, beat Him almost to the point of death, and ultimately, hung Him on a cross to die.

It made me stop and think about how I feel about my enemies. I must admit, I fall so fall short of this type of love, there may not be a known measurement small enough to categorize it.

It is Jesus’ kind of love that we are commanded show our enemies. After all, when Jesus died for us, we had all sinned and were all, because of sin, his enemies. We all abandoned Him, every single one of us. There He hung, with love for each of us in his heart and in His deeds. Even as He took our sin punishment of death and we denied Him, He never faltered or said, but God, they deserve to die for their own sins. Why should We make such a sacrifice for these sinners?

If you stop and think about the individuals you would die to protect, chances are good, like me, that most are relatives, perhaps children. Almost certainly not casual friends or neighbors. Definitely not those who are treating you poorly. How about a serial killer who tortures and murders children? What about someone like Hitler or Mao or Stalin? Absolutely not, right?

Jesus loved them and died for them, too. He would have taken the ultimate punishment if only one of them could be saved and the rest of the world lost.

I’m so glad that Jesus wasn’t like me. That He loved so much more and so much more freely. He didn’t take the attitude that you reap what you sow. If He had, I would be completely lost.

Back to the sermon… the pastor threw a statement at the end of it for each of us to pray for an individual that we disliked, even if the prayer wasn’t heartfelt. It struck me like a bolt that I was supposed to pray for G. Not the three women, just her. I was to pray with my heart and emotions and not just with my mind.

Once the sermon was over, I asked my husband who he was supposed to pray for. He responded, G. That was confirmation enough. We stopped what we were doing and starting praying for her. We have continued to pray for her both together and separately. This time, with more feeling that ever before.

I found out, around this time, that G. had been booted out of the reviewer forum. As to why,I have no idea; however, I knew that others had suffered her mocking as well and probably just got tired of dealing with her constant sniping. She was also being vilified (and deservedly so) at another forum that I know of.

Wednesday night (or more accurately, Thursday morning), at 3:42am, I woke up, saw the time and started to go back to sleep. The voice of God came into my mind with an urgent command. He said, Pray for G. I’ve learned the hard way, it is best to obey God immediately when He gives a command or request that is undeniable. He didn’t have to say it twice this time.

So, I starting praying for her. I have no idea what is going on in her life but I prayed for her deliverance from whatever it is and for her salvation. I prayed for her hurt and pain to go away. That she find the loving Savior to bring comfort to her life.

My prayers were different this time. They were loving and sincere as if she was my best friend. I was crying for her and wishing with my whole heart and mind that her eternal life could be saved. As suddenly as I woke up, I knew I was to stop praying and go back to sleep. I immediately fell asleep and slept through the rest of the night. I will continue to pray for her, but this time, with my whole heart.

Whether or not my prayers were effective for her so far, I may never know this side of heaven. I will continue praying for her fervently until I hear from her directly that my prayers have been answered.

The blessing I have personally received by listening to and obeying God is that I know that I have changed for the better. I don’t feel the way I did before. As Jesus commanded, I am learning to love and to pray for those who hurt me. I’m learning, bit by bit, to be more like Christ.

1 John 3:2 Dear friends, now we are children of God, and what we will be has not yet been made known. But we know that when Christ appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.

The doctors were perplexed when it came to diagnosing my illness. You see, I not only had pneumonia, breathing issues, and low oxygen rates, I was also coughing up blood. I was repeatedly asked if I had left the country in the past few weeks, if I had recently been to Africa, or if I had been around someone who had been there.

It was an interesting set of questions as I had certainly not been traveling but a worker at a big box store, who had an African accent, was so taken with my eyeglasses, that she took them off my face and put them on her own. I was a little taken aback but thought maybe that was part of her culture. I asked the doctors if that might be the answer they were looking for.

But no, that was not it. I realized that they were looking for some sort of Ebola-style virus because of my symptoms… that, and the fact that they had put me in an airborne infection isolation room. It was a bit funny to me, sick as I was, that they were wearing their hazmat gear but my husband was sitting by my side in his regular clothes and was being allowed to come and go as he pleased.

They pretty quickly decided I was not airborne contagious and then moved me into a droplet contagious isolation room. The Infectious Diseases doctor told me he was running every known test (thank goodness for good healthcare insurance) and the tests were coming back negative. Still, he started me on a wide variety of antibiotics which I stayed on until I was released from the hospital but had me moved into a regular pulmonology hospital room for the rest of my stay.

The first pulmonologist I saw was determined that I had a progressive lung disease or, at best, an auto-immune disease. He rotated off and a new pulmonologist, Dr. V appeared. She asked me the same sort of questions but then asked if there was anything around the house that I might have inhaled. I thought about it and then told her about the new old stock that I had from my internet needlework business. Based on the age of the business, there would not have been an issue; however, I had bought the stock of an older distributor/store that might have had items as old as forty years. That, she determined, could have caused an allergic reaction.

She started me on steroids which, as she told me later, saved my life. She told my husband to remove all of the craft items from the house and have it cleaned before she would release me to come home. He got it accomplished in two days. What she said to me was that my craft items and various collections were “Toxic to you. They will kill you.”

Once I got home, I thought about this warning. In my mind’s eye, the items aged and rotted and were good for nothing short of a hazardous waste dump. When I said as much to my husband, he was in shock. He reminded me that we had always packed everything very well for storing, that I included damp removers in the room they were stored and that everything was brand-new and in great condition.

That had been part of the problem. We had been carrying these items around with us for 12 years at great expense when storing them and, when moved into our house, taking up a large amount of room. It wasn’t as if I could possibly finish all of the kits, let alone the patterns, in my lifetime. My husband and I used to joke that the two of us could finish them during the 1,000 year reign of Christ (maybe.)

I had sold a good bit of it on Ebay but when my grandson had heart surgery at six weeks old, I stopped selling and also my needlework designs and instead started watching him Monday through Friday while his parents worked. It was a wonderful release and I enjoyed watching him so much. Once he was well enough for preschool, I decided not to sell and postponed design work indefinitely. We still had way too much, especially of the needlework kits and patterns.

Periodically, my husband and I would get determined to just dump everything except for a few of the items which we had purchased for our own use. That included not only the needlework items but also several other craft collections we had amassed together.

As we would start to go through the items, we would be reminded of how much money they were worth and I would say that maybe I should try to sell them once again. That must have happened three or four times in the last two years. While I would not feel like doing the work to sell them, we could not keep from looking back at the money they cost and that they could earn.

So, once again, I was determined to dump everything and my husband brought up their worth and that, unlike what the doctor thought, they were in great condition. So, I took it to the Lord.

This was during the weeks when I could not fall asleep at nights (due to steroids) and the Holy Spirit was keeping me company throughout those hours. When I asked if I should dump everything, I was told no. So I asked if I should sell everything and again I was told no. So I asked if I was supposed to keep these items.

God told me no, once again. However, this time, He told me that while the items were not toxic to me physically (which was later confirmed by the Mayo Clinic), they were toxic to me spiritually. I was putting the price and value of physical things ahead of spiritual things. Because of my attitude, the things which were not harmful in their own right, became things of the world, sinful and deadly.

He told me that I needed to give away those items which were only worth money to me (keeping only that which He approved of) and to stop looking back at those things and the life that He had removed us from. It was time to move forward and look ahead, not to wallow and get stuck in and unable to move out of the past. But, instead, to have a future and a life with deeper meaning and to do the work He had for me to do.

To say that I was shocked was to put it mildly. I had never, until then, thought of the items as sinful. I knew that I wanted to be rid of them but neither my husband nor myself could bring ourselves to throw them away. But to give them away? We both love giving to others.

As confirmation, the next day, I received a flyer in the mail that listed all of the assisted living facilities in my town. I knew then who should receive the items. I wanted to hurry up and get well so I could go drop them off. I kept setting deadlines and missing them. It just wasn’t for me to do. Between recovering (and an additional lung surgery) and the horrible ‘flu epidemic this year, I needed to stay home.

Then God sent my home health physical/respiratory therapist. I was supposed to work with one individual and, instead, another one showed up. Within a short time, I found out that he was a Christian and that he worked with assisted living housed patients. When I asked if he would be willing to take my collection items to the groups he worked in, he said yes. I realized at that point that God had sent him for this purpose as well as my therapy.

So, for the first time in years, we are clearing the collections out of the house for good. There are some items which I get to keep (though I will do a second run through those as well.) Between my therapist and the Salvation Army, God is taking the burden off of our shoulders and providing it to those who can use it. We are still only halfway through but we know, in a short time, we will be able to remove this anchor to the past which has been keeping us from moving forward.

Because of our sin nature, we can bring sin into our lives in many different ways. For me, one way was by holding onto the past. If you feel like there are things from your past, either belongings or habits that may be holding you back, I ask you to look at your life. Try to identify what things or habits you have, in time and thought and even pocketbook, put ahead of the Lord. Ask God what He wants from you. Perhaps these are the things that, like me, have been holding you back from the path that Jesus wants you to walk.

Genesis 19:26 But Lot’s wife looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.

When I was a little girl, about four years old, my parents would send the four of us kids to Sunday School each week. I don’t seem to remember them attending very often themselves but we kids would take the bus to the local Nazarene Church.

Sunday School was a wonderful time for me. I loved hearing the teacher talk about Jesus and how much He loved us all. My family was large but, sadly, there wasn’t much love in it. There was arguing and even worse pretty much every day of the week. I was as much of the problem as anyone, being sullen and unhappy. I would talk back and do things I knew would make my parents angry with me.

So, going to such a beautiful place and learning about someone who loved me was the high point of my week and even of my life. I looked forward to it and was happy to be learning memory work so I could say the verses to myself throughout the week.

When a child turned five at this Sunday School, you would graduate into the older group from the preschool group. Just before that date, my Sunday School teacher told us about sin. That it was breaking our Father’s rules. I understood that very well as I knew I was breaking my own parent’s rules. I didn’t understand, until that point, that I was also breaking God’s rules.

Even as a five year old, I felt convicted of sin as much as I have ever felt as an adult. I spent the following week so unhappy just thinking about how bad a girl I had been and how I could not make myself do anything to make it go away.

The next Sunday, the teacher told us how Jesus had died for our sins and asked if any of us wanted to accept Jesus and His forgiveness and ask Him to take control of our lives.

Though I was a shy child, in this case, I jumped up to be first in line. I remember bowing my head and asking Jesus to save me and make me a good girl. I knew that He had done so because I started being able to talk to Him within my thoughts and could feel His comfort and response. The next week I graduated and was given my own Bible to commemorate the event.

I would love to say that I started living a Christian life right then but, instead, we moved away for a year and did not go to church. When we moved back, church was not something we did on a regular basis. The only teaching I got at that point was from the Bible classes I could take twice a week when a local church sent a bus to sit just outside my elementary school campus.

When we again moved, that stopped and so did church of any sort. My parents were Christians in name only which is to say, they were not Christians at all. So, the days of my learning about the Bible were at an end, except for reading from the Bible I was given years before.

I soon began conforming to the world. I still felt oddly protected from much of what was commonplace for teens at the time. I didn’t drink or take drugs or indulge in the behavior that many of my friends were involved in. Even my next older sister and older brother were into all of those things. They tried to get me to do drugs and more but, I think, God kept His hand on me and protected me from all of this.

It was when my next older sister found Jesus and was on fire talking about him, that I actually started behaving poorly. I didn’t want to hear her but she simply would not stop talking. Anyone who ever knew my sister, Kiki, would say amen. She could talk and she loved talking about the love of Jesus and His salvation message.

She passed away last year and what I remember most about her was lifelong passion for Christ. She is responsible for bringing the word of salvation into our family. She was so persistent because she cared so much. She got my mother to start watching Christian television because, after she divorced my father, my mother would not set foot in a church.

As soon as I was able to, I moved out on my own. It was at that time that I started behavior that would bring my world crashing in on me. When it happened and my life bottomed out, I remembered what my sister had talked about and also about Christian television.

When, in desperation, I turned it on, the preacher, Dwight Thompson, was talking. It was as if he knew all about me and what I had done and what had happened to me. As I sat on my sofa and wept, he told me that Jesus still loved me, no matter what I had done or what had happened in my life. He gave an altar call that I responded to, flat on my face on my living room floor.

In the years and decades since then, I have always known Jesus as my Savior. There were times, even years, when I didn’t give much thought to Him and certainly very little time or effort in telling others about Him. I was too busy living life and raising my children.

God took a distant place in my life. When my son passed away after an almost two year battle with leukemia, I started placing God first once again but still did little to further His Kingdom. I did insert Him into my (now closed) internet business and, at His request, I told the story of my son’s illness and death and linked to it from the first words on this business homepage.

This was the first time I had written specifically for God and at His request. Even though that business is closed, we still keep the story where others can read it. This is David’s story: A True Story.

When I was brought back from the brink of death, I started looking back at what I’ve done with my life. It was the times when I, essentially, turned my back on God that I regret the most. My wasted years were those times when I could have been doing something, anything, to further the Word of His saving and healing power.

During the last few months, the need to take action on Jesus’ behalf has sat on me like a weighted stone on my chest. Here I was, unable to leave the house. Weak, dependent on oxygen 24/7, even immunosuppressed for a good portion of the time. The irony was evident to me, of course. When I was able to get out and about, I didn’t use my time wisely. Once I was ill and could not leave the house, that was when I wanted most to begin my work for Him.

Once I realized that I was supposed to write and found the subject that I was to write about, I questioned God as to whether or not this was His calling on my life.

His response was in the form of two questions. He asked if He could rely on me. Then He asked me if I was willing to live the life and to do the work He had called me to with the gifts that He had given me. Now, today, with no more waiting to be a better person, to feel a bit stronger, or to wait for a burning bush style sign from heaven. No more excuses, no more delays, no more fear of the unknown. His questions were: Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?

Here am I, Lord. Send me.

John 3:16-17 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.

I had been told that I was going to die and soon. To get my affairs in order. It turned out that God had a different plan. He had something more He wanted me to do. Something that I had been ignoring and, instead, had been going my own way through life. It took a drastic turn of events to get my whole attention, but this was certainly the point at which I stopped what I was doing to reassess my life.

I’ve been a Christian for more than four decades. During that time, while knowing Jesus as my personal Lord and Savior, I haven’t given serious thought to where and what God wanted me to do. Measuring by man’s standard, I have been successful at almost everything I have put my hand to. Among them, I’ve worked my way up a large technical company to a high-paid and respected position with lots of travel and perks. I’ve also had a very successful internet business. Most recently, I have attained (and maintained for the last two years) the top reviewer position at a well-known internet shopping site.

During the days following my hospitalization last November, I was being both comforted and schooled by the Holy Spirit during the long hours I was awake. The steroids I had been given kept me awake constantly for weeks. You can see my earlier blog post about those days here: It sure beats counting sheep…

I was told, in no uncertain terms, that for at least a short time, I was to stop posting reviews of a certain type on that commerce site. I was allowed to write them for my own blog and youtube channel and even to post them elsewhere. There wasn’t anything wrong with the products I was reviewing nor with my reviewing them. What was wrong was how I felt about posting the reviews at the big site. I had let it become too important to me.

For a number of weeks, it was a moot point. I wasn’t feeling well enough to do much more than just get through the day. With each day, I felt stronger and started feeling boredom. I started to fall back into the bad behavior pattern. After all, the reviews were written and I was posting them elsewhere, why not there as well?

Around the same time, I was told that I would have to have a surgery to help diagnose the root of my health issues. That surgery set me back to barely getting through the day.

As I recovered a bit this time, I might have gone back to my ways but, in the meantime, my husband and I had started attending a new church via the internet. They were just starting a new series on Pick One, a discussion about making decisions. The focus was finding the path God wanted for you. If ever anything was meant for me to study, it was this. All of the sermons in this series meant much to me but two things really stand out.

In one sermon, the senior pastor posed these questions:

What are you doing now that you that you know you shouldn’t be doing?

What are you not doing now that you know you should be doing?

The first question was easy to answer. It was something that God and I had been discussing for a couple of months by that point. Changing my behavior had been difficult.

Trying to find out what I should be doing was even more difficult. It certainly would have been a lot easier if God spoke to me out of a burning bush and told me what to do. While that would have made my life easier, it would not have allowed me to grow and learn in my walk with Him.

Instead, I started thinking about what it was that I really wanted to do. I also asked other Christians close to me what they thought my skill or gift might be. The answer was always the same – I was told “you are a storyteller and a writer – you need to write.”

One might think that writing reviews would fulfill that gift. Especially when I had attained one of the most sought after positions as far as reviewers are concerned. But I was being told that while I could continue to write and post other reviews, I was to stop posting the type of reviews that put me in that top position. I was good at it and successful, wasn’t that enough to fulfill my writing desires?

Then, in another sermon in the same series, a teaching pastor made a statement that stopped me dead in my tracks and made me ponder everything I have done in my life. To paraphrase what he said, “If you succeed at doing the wrong things, then you are failing.”

You would also think that being at the top of the heap would have given me some sense of satisfaction, well-being, or perhaps a little self-glory. Nope, not at all. It was nothing to me. If anything, having once attained this high rank, I felt somehow compelled, against my will, to keep up the work to retain it. Interesting, isn’t it? Something that I didn’t want and didn’t care about became something that consumed my thoughts, my work, my money and almost my life.

When I started looking back over what I had accomplished in my life, I realized that, apart from my children and family, all else that I had worked for was meaningless. There was no “there” there. When everything was said and done, no one would remember any of it.

I began searching for what it was that I was supposed to write about or which genre would be the one that I would approach. My husband and I spoke at length about it. Throughout my “writing” career over the decades, my efforts had been either as employee for various companies or under a pen name for reviews. I had never put myself out there under my own name. I realized that whatever it was that I was supposed to write, it would have to be under my name. There would be nothing hidden this time.

Oddly enough, years ago, my husband had obtained a website address that was my name. I had forgotten all about it until this point. It came to mind and I realized that, initially, my writing would be on this website. But what?

Again, in the Pick One series at church, there was a study guide question that had immense significance to me during this period of indecision. It was:

How have you seen God use your life experiences and past hurts to help, comfort, and minister to others? Has that helped bring clarity to your calling?

Once I read those two sentences, I knew what I was supposed to write about on my website: my life experiences and past hurts. I had finally found what I was searching for.

That is how this blog began. I’ve found the path that God wants me to be on and the way to use the gift of communication He has given me. I will continue it as long as God directs me to do so. Each week, as I sit down to write, I think I know what my subject will be. Each week, I’ve written something entirely different from what my thoughts were inclined toward. I’ve found that His ways and thoughts are much better than mine.

I have found that writing these stories are both emotionally trying and, at the same time, immensely satisfying in a way my work has never been before. It is my deepest wish that these stories will bring some measure of comfort and assistance to you. That God will use these words to minister to you as well.

Isaiah 55:8-9 “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.

When my husband and I decided to move from Austin to Collin County (suburb just north of Dallas, TX), our hearts were set on living in Plano, the city where our eldest daughter lived.

The decision to move was easy. I had been terribly allergic to Mountain Juniper. It is one of those things that are an incredibly high allergen, even referred to as toxic. During the seven years we lived in Austin, once diagnosed, I had to stay at home, indoors, from November through March each year. If I ventured outside, I would wear a mask and cover my eyes and ears until we were out of the nature preserve area we lived in near Lake Travis.

My allergy meant we would move eventually but I was content to stay home. Even when I tore my hamstring laterally (an injury that may never heal) and had problems getting up and down the stairs to our bedroom, I was content. It was when my husband started developing hives all over (and he is diabetic) that we knew we had to move and soon. In addition to that, a further incentive arose when my elder daughter told us that she and her husband were eager to start a family. Then, our younger daughter (who lives in Austin), informed us that she was getting married. It seemed like the path was open for us to move.

Well, except that we could not find a house! We were able to sell our house quickly and the new owners needed to get into it as soon as possible (they had triplets and really needed the larger space the house would provide.) So, we ended up staying in the apartment we had rented in Austin (we wanted to keep the cats safe while the house was being shown and provide a workplace for my husband who works from home and we had thought it would take weeks or even months our house to sell.)

Turns out that finding a house in Collin County was not going to be easy. I spent weeks with a realtor, looking at more than 70 houses we would happily have purchased (but they all ended up being sold just ahead of our quickly provided offer.) The realtor was beginning to really dislike taking me out as it seemed to be a doomed enterprise.

While we were venturing to and fro around Plano, I kept seeing a church that really spoke to my spirit. As we passed it, yet again, one day, I asked the realtor if we could look in the neighborhood we were in. She told me that I wouldn’t like it.

I was puzzled by her response as I didn’t feel she knew me well enough to make such a statement. Then I recalled a conversation we had had about a local builder who had done such a poor job on building their houses that many of the owners were suing them. I figured that was what she meant and put the thoughts of both the neighborhood and the church out of my mind.

I was determined to be very involved with the church we ended up at after this move and, for some reason, that equaled living close by in my mind. I don’t know why because I had never lived close to a church I had attended in the past.

We ended up buying a larger house than I had envisioned which was located in a city next to Plano rather than in Plano itself. Still, I missed the thought of that church and asked my daughter what was wrong with the neighborhood there. She told me not a thing. It was just a little older and a little less expensive. That made sense as our realtor wasn’t too pleased with our final choice (which my daughter had located) as it was considerably less expensive than the houses she had been showing us. Still, over the years since, when we passed by the church in Plano, I would still feel the same longing and the pull of my heart.

However, as I thought we had to live close to our new church, I started looking for other churches and found one almost on our doorstep. Each time we would pass that church, I would suggest to my husband that we start attending it. He would agree but we never got around to it. It was like we had amnesia every Sunday morning. This went on for five years! We were essentially unchurched except for the programs we watched on TV.

My daughter switched churches the year I became ill. She invited us to try her new church as she thought we would enjoy it. We agreed and planned to visit but, unfortunately, two surgeries in a row got in the way of my leaving the house. Then I started having episodes of vertigo and became more than a little afraid of leaving the house on the chance I would have one while out.

Then, out of the blue, I was hospitalized with severe pneumonia and low oxygen readings. As I began to recover a bit, a real regret that I had was that I had not attended my daughter’s church with our grandchildren. I told her so and she informed me that her church had live streaming of their Sunday services. I asked her to send my husband a link and we would watch.

When my husband brought the link up on our Apple TV, I about fell out of my chair. I told him excitedly, “That’s the church I wanted to go to. The one in Plano!” He had no idea what I was talking about. I tried reminding him about the church that had drawn at my heart. It took a ten minute discussion to discover that I had never told him about this church. I had only mentioned the church that was close by. That week we watched our first service and have been faithful attendees ever since.

As I write this, we have yet to physically attend a service at Chase Oaks Church (due to my current need to avoid viruses, etc. while the country struggles through the horrible ‘flu season of 2017-2018.) Even so, we feel as if we are members already. Their live online ministry allows us to be a part of the service as if we were there.

The church’s online outreach is growing as I write this post. My husband and I already know that we have a heart for this area of the church. I think of people like me, who temporarily can’t attend for whatever reason, those who can’t leave their homes at all, those who live too far away to attend, and especially those who live in countries and areas where being a Christian or attending a service could mean jail time or even a death sentence.

If you are interested in hearing the Word spoken through this group of pastors, here is the link to the Live portion of their website:

Chase Oaks Live

Here is their sermon archive:

Chase Oaks Sermon Archive

Here is their website which links to explanations of their core beliefs and outreach services:

Chase Oaks Church, Plano TX

There are times in my life when I have known beyond a doubt that God has led me to a certain point and place. This is one of those times. For whatever reason He has for my husband and I to be there, we know that God has led us to this the church. From the first sermon, each message seems to have written specifically for us at exactly this point in our lives.

While my desire to be at this church had been in my mind all along, it took a major, life-changing event to bring me to attending it. If I had not become so ill, who knows if I would ever have gone on my own? A lesson learned here is to listen to God when He speaks to your heart and go to the path He has placed ahead of you.

Isaiah 48:17 This is what the LORD says — your Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel: “I am the LORD your God, who teaches you what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go.”

One of the interesting side effects (and there are quite a few) from using Prednisone steroid (or in my case, more precisely liquid Prednisolone which is lactose free), is that you sleep very little. I wasn’t warned about this side effect (or any others for that matter) until after I was about tapered off the drug. I simply was awake all night long without understanding why.

When I have suffered insomnia before my illness, I would toss and turn trying to get back to sleep without much success. My experience with weeks of sleeplessness from this steroid turned out to be entirely different.

I was released from the hospital after a stay of nine days. Apparently, this was done without my primary doctor’s orders as she was surprised, in not a good way, when I called her the next week to ask some questions. I guess this is what happens when a great doctor dares to take a weekend off. Once she was gone, I was out of the hospital door pretty quickly without sufficient explanation or instructions. Note to self – try to get discharged from hospitals on a weekday when the primary crew is around.

Starting with the first night, as my husband would nod off, I would come quickly and fully awake and would stay so all night long. I tried reading but I couldn’t concentrate too well (again, another steroid side effect.) Then I did what I should have done immediately – I prayed that God would either let me sleep or give me peace while I was awake. That I would not spend those hours with a troubled mind and be fearful of the future.

That prayer opened the floodgates of God’s love and protection for me. As it turns out, I did not sleep at all. Instead, the Holy Spirit spent those hours speaking with me – each and every night so I was never alone. Being awake at night became a blessing. God could speak to me for all of those hours with my full attention; something that had been so difficult to do during the daytime when my mind was busy with all that was going on around me.

I can’t attest to whether or not someone who is passing has their life flash before their eyes, but I can tell you that through those days and weeks, I saw a slow motion view of my life starting from when I was a toddler through the present day.

What God did for me was to walk me through my life and help me heal from hurts, understand how I had hurt others, and finally, how I had moved off the path He had for my life and to understand that I needed to make big changes for my life to have real meaning.

I can’t explain everything that was revealed to me. Some of the hurts had been so well buried, I did not bring them easily to my conscious mind. God explained what had happened and why. Then He told me to release the pain. When I learned also, how my actions had hurt others, I was convicted with guilt. He told me to release that as well.

Most nights I wept throughout and, in the morning when my husband woke up, I would tell him everything I had learned the night before.

What I learned during that time was that while I knew Christ had forgiven me and wiped away my sins, I was having a hard time forgiving myself and others. I carried my guilt around like a heavy anchor that I would drag behind me.

As one example, God brought to my mind the enormous guilt I had over the things I had done wrong as a mother to my three children. While the punishments I meted out were not bad by society’s standard, to me, the times I took my anger out on them when I was really angry with someone else was untenable. I had changed my ways (through prayer) and had apologized to each of them. They had each, in turn, forgiven me. The problem was that I had yet to forgive myself.

When my eldest child, my son David, was 18 and was fighting against the aggressive leukemia that eventually took his life a few months later, I was drowning in my guilt once again. I apologized once more for my poor parenting and he looked at me in bewilderment and said, “Mom, I have already forgiven you. Why would you bring it up again?”

I remember being shocked at my son’s response and how I understood that his response would be the same as that of Jesus when I continued to feel guilt and confess sins that He had already forgiven. While I had that understanding, for some reason, I was unable to let it go in my heart.

I also carried my hurts close to my heart. Through God’s revelations to me, I learned to forgive myself and, where possible, to ask forgiveness of others.

Getting my life back on God’s path for me is something that is taking time. I learned much about what I was doing wrong but, like a good parent, He is letting me learn for myself what it is that I am to do. It’s been amazing how much has become clear as I opened myself up to changing my life. I will never be sorry to be sleepless again as I know I can call upon God to keep company with me and He will come to my aid.

The changes in my husband and my lives will be the subject of many posts in the future. My hope is that these stories will help you in your Christian walk or provide edification to anyone who is searching for meaning and wondering what Christianity, Jesus, and salvation is all about.

Psalms 46:1 God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble.