My Love Story

My Love Testimony

 

And they have conquered him by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their Testimony, for they loved not their lives even unto death. Revelation 12:11

 

I am living proof that the Light of Truth is able to expose, and transform, any extent of our wrong thinking. This is how the Spirit of Truth led me to the Way of Truth and Life, where I learned to trust in the Unfailing Love of our Creator. 

 

Looking back, I can see the lies I’d believed, and how they had full reign over my life. It wasn’t until I learned how to humble myself that I found true security and freedom. Lies don’t just lay down and die, on the contrary, I didn’t know I was in bondage until I tried to break free. 

 

I learned from the Spirit of Truth, Who gives Wisdom generously to all who ask, and without finding fault, how to Prevail over hasatan, the adversary, of everything that Is True, Good, and Right. I just never expected the enemy to be my own “Self,” “Ego,” “Flesh,” “Pride,” or whatever we want to call our “Sinful Nature.” 

 

It truly is the Struggle of the Testing, those the Fiery Trials, that develop our perseverance, which strengthen us, and makes us mature and complete. James 1:4, 5

 

Like Jacob we all struggle with man, and with God. When he Prevailed he was given an new name, Israel, Genesis 32:28; 35:10.

My Goal to Get Baptized

As a child I had a strange goal, not to go to Disneyland, but to be baptized into the Christian faith. I call this a good example of reverse psychology, since it was something I couldn’t do until I was 18. 

 

My Aunt had taken me to church on Sundays from the time I was too young to remember, and I had two grand-mothers who also influenced my beliefs.

 

My parents agreed to raise their children differently. Their own religious upbringings were very strict so they gave me, and my younger brother, a choice. My weekend trips to church with my Aunt ended when I was about 10, so I tucked away my dream of being baptized. Who knew what a mess I would make of my life before I turned 18.

The Wrong Crowd

During my freshman year of high school I slid right in with the “wrong crowd.” I felt pressured to smoke pot and drink in excess.

 

That summer I met my first husband at 15. I had just started smoking cigarettes and he said, “I don’t date girls who smoke.” I credit him to this day that I’m not a smoker. We got married when I was 17, and he was 20.

 

I was18 when I found out that I was pregnant. The reality shocked me enough to stop drinking and straighten up. I loved this baby girl, sight unseen, and now my goal was to be a good mom. Which reminded me of my goal of getting baptized, so I started looking for a church.

 

My husband and I were separated at the time, but we reunited in hopes that having a baby would help our marriage. We began going to different churches together, but after our daughter was born we separated for the final time and divorced.

My daughter and I moved in with my dearest, lifelong, friends, who just happened to be Seventh Day Adventist.

 

Finally Baptized

 

I got baptized in the S.D.A. Church. I loved everything about the rules, traditions, potlucks, music, and the fellowship with people that made it feel like I was part of a big family. It wasn’t long before I started feeling pressured to get married to a “godly man.”

 

My daughter was almost two years old and people kept telling me I couldn’t let her grow up without a dad and a family.

By the time I was twenty-two I gave in and married a man from an exceptionally strict SDA family, who was also divorced with three children, ages 10, 8, and 5.

 

If We have to Give In We Are Being Manipulated

 

After four years of trying to conform completely to my new expectations; quitting my favorite job, working in the laboratory for two Rheumatologists, cooking vegan vegetarian food, not watching television, movies, no music with a drum beat, no jewelry, all the laundry and bed sheets washed, floors mopped, home-made bread baked, food prepared every week before Sabbath…

 

Looking back I can see myself slowly drowning in despair because as hard as I tried I couldn’t keep up. I started to believe there was something wrong with me, that I must be a terrible mom, and step-mom, because other women could keep up with everything…

My Subconscious Act of Rebellion

One day I subconsciously rebelled and everything came to a head. It was a very rare day, I was at the mall with my daughter, and we passed by a kiosk that said, “free piercing with purchase.” My daughter pointed to the tiniest pair of ear-rings I’d ever seen. 

Although I knew the consequences I agreed that they were so cute. I let my daughter pierce her ears, and I re-pierce my ears.

 

The news traveled fast through my little church community in Hazel Dell Washington. I started getting phone calls asking, and telling me “not to come back to church.” Mothers were upset about my bad influence on their daughters. Someone even told me that God would never forgive me for piercing my daughters ears.

 

In spite of the warnings I kept my routine and went to the Wednesday night prayer meeting. Afterwards the Pastor sat me down and told me that all he saw when he looked at me were the (pin head size) earrings I was wearing.

 

My church had become like family, so the rejection hurt at a deep level. I knew I was the same person, with or without the earrings, and I’d related the people and the Pastor with God.

 

Considering a Permanent Solution to a Temporary Problem?

 

A familiar depression revisited me, like when I was a teenager. I would shut myself in my room right when I got home from school. Sometimes hiding the fact that I’d come home stoned, but always to drown out the emptiness I felt inside with the loud noise I called music.

 

Now the loud noise was in my mind. I was full of chaos and hopeless confusion with no light at the end of the tunnel. I felt trapped in a place of torment. I’d given in to the pressure of getting re-married to a “godly man” in the church and another divorce was not an option.

 

I was losing the battle with my tormenting thoughts constantly reminding me of all my faults. I gave into to my nagging desire for some relief and I took a step toward that direction. It was like I stepped into the eye of the storm, my mind was quiet and calm, the silence was eerie as I proceeded toward the bathroom…

 

Then I clearly heard this thought in my mind, “die to yourself and live for Me,” and instantly, like a light switch, I had hope.

 

My Road Trip to Freedom

 

I was far from understanding what dying to my self meant. The only thing I cared about was freeing myself from a trap. I loaded my Toyota Corolla, and my 6 year old daughter, and I drove all the way to Arizona, where my parents had recently moved.

 

I felt really blessed to get a job the day after I arrived, in a hospital laboratory. I remember thanking God, over and over, for allowing me to be so happy. I was completely clueless of the life lessons I was about to learn from the temporary happiness of this life.

 

Finding Happiness

 

I’d never felt so happy, everyday was a blue sky day, even in January. I joined a gym and started taking aerobics classes, where I met a very attractive man teaching the Tuesday and Thursday night classes. I noticed he played contemporary Christian music, and I fell into an infatuation like I’d never experienced before. I started thinking about him morning and night.

 

He finally asked me out on a date and my heart skipped a beat. I melted when he looked at me, and again I thanked God because now I thought I knew what “True Love” felt like. The only thing true about Infatuation is it really does make you blind.

 

I remember giving in again, on everything I’d told myself I’d never do, like ever getting re-married, or becoming another religion.

He eventually proposed and then told me I had to become Lutheran. I even put my foot down and said no, but as I watched him leave, he stood outside looking at me through the window, manipulating me with his tears, until I finally gave in.

 

We got married when I was twenty-eight. Our wedding seemed like a fairy tail, but it ended with a huge windstorm. I didn’t notice my daughter’s sad expression until I saw our wedding pictures. Still, I continued to thank God for blessing me with true love and happiness.

 

My Mountain Top Face Plant

 

Unexpectedly, but to our delight, I got pregnant within the first month of our marriage, with a son. I’d already began to notice his interest in other women, and by the time our son was a toddler it was no secret. I heard those dreaded words, “there’s someone else” and “I never loved you.” 

 

Despite any song lyrics, there is no temporary happiness that is worth the pain of a face plant from the heights of infatuation.

 

Life Became a Blur of Stress

 

The busyness of life kept me existing in self-preservation mode. I worked overtime and took night classes as my thirties flew by in a blur of stress. Now I was a single mom with two children. I had just enough belief in God to blame Him just as much as I’d thanked Him. Not just for my pain, but for all the pain and suffering in the entire world.

 

I wasn’t feeling the hopelessness of depression, like I’d experienced previously, it felt more like hardness, bitterness, and numbness, with a lot of underlying anger.

 

During this time my daughter began to fly to Oregon to visit her dad and step-mom. They wanted to show here some stability, so she started spending the school year there. One day at work I got one of those dreaded phone calls that my daughter was in the emergency room and wasn’t expected to live.

 

I arrived in Portland not knowing if she would be dead or alive. They said she would need a liver transplant if she survived. When I saw my daughter she told me she didn’t really want to die. The nurse said she’d seen many girls who’d taken a handful of Tylenol in an emotional moment and three days later they go into liver failure, even after regretting what they’d done.

 

My daughter was 14 at the time and her liver did recover. I fully expected to take her home with me, but the counselors concluded that it would be better for her to live in Portland where she had friends.

 

Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, I was diagnosed with Basal Cell skin cancer. This left me with an ugly scar right in the middle of my chest, and more negative thinking.

 

My emotions seemed to be dead, and it was affecting my concentration, so I finally went to a Counselor. She suggested I needed to make myself cry, I hadn’t grieved almost losing my daughter and I missed her. I rented a sad movie and tried to cry until I made “donkey noises,” like she told me. And I took her advice and when to a single parents class at Grace Community Church.

 

A  few weeks into the class, the Pastor, asked me why I didn’t go to Church?  I told him how I felt about the hypocrites that go to church and he said, “there’s always room for one more.” We laughed, and he told me that he doesn’t look at the problems, he goes to see how he can help. Helping people has always appealed to me so I went.

Tailor Making My Own Religion

 

About the same time a co-worker told me about Gin Shin and that it had really helped her, so I jumped in with both feet.

After years of searching for what I thought was Truth, living my own way, and feeling self-sufficient, I turned on my radio and heard, “there are people tailor making their own beliefs these days…” 

 

It was freaky to hear exactly what I’d been doing, what seemed right in my own eyes.

That was the night I could finally see the mess I’d made of my life, by doing things my own way, and I was more than ready to give up and let God show me His way.

A Spiritual Touch

 

The next Sunday morning I was sitting near the back of a packed auditorium, and I remember the Pastor’s words going straight to my heart. Again the message was about ordering my own life by picking and choosing what I thought was true. It felt like a Spiritual Touch overwhelmed me, like a concrete wall was breaking, and tears started flooding down my face.

 

The Pastor began summoning people to come forward to re-dedicate their lives. Instead of leaving so nobody would see me sobbing, I got up and headed toward the front, as if I was being ushered.  

 

When I got to the front the pastor shook my hand and a woman prayed for me, and gave me a Bible. I walked away stunned, and drove all the way home wondering why, and how, God would still love me?

 

We are Drawn by Unfailing Loving Kindness

YHVH appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn you with Unfailing loving kindess, Jeremiah 31:3

 

After that, I read the Bible everyday and very slowly began to believe that God had never given up on me. It was like He let me go my own way, and then turned all the bad into something good, Romans 8:28.

 

Now I had a greater appreciation for His Unfailing Merciful Love, because those who have been forgiven much love much, Luke 7:46-48.  

 

The lies I’d believed were slowly being exposed by the Truth I was learning. I’d wake up thinking about His Love in the morning and I’d go to bed thinking about His Faithfulness. Every little thing reminded me of His presence, and it is still my greatest delight to keep my thoughts focused on His Love. 

 

My favorite thing to do is still to search for Him, in His Word, in His creation, in silence, in music, in laughter, but especially in the pain.

 

This was just the beginning of my spiritual hunger and thirst that continues to intensify the more I read and study His Living Word; the Torah and the words of the Prophets that match up:

 

For the Word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it pierces even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart, Hebrews 4:12

 

Now, in view of all life’s difficulties, I can personally testify to the Truth, that even when we are unfaithful, God’s Faithfulness, Provision, Comfort, Mercy, Compassion and Loving Kindness is Eternal.

 

Then and Now

My heart was not full of Merciful Love, and I did not care about others as I care about myself.  

Now I know this life is not about my own happiness. It is about living to do what God defines as Right in His Instructions; the Torah. 

I was full of bitterness and holding grudges, now I pray for the people who hurt me and I ask God to bless them the way He has blessed me to finally understand the Truth of His Unfailing Merciful Love.  

 

I was impatient and He is teaching me how to be long-suffering. I was always in a hurry, now I stop myself when I’m in a rush, and discipline my thoughts to make them slow down with God’s pace. 

 

I used to pray one-sided prayers that were all about me and what I wanted God to do. Now I just spend time being still and knowing…  I’m not the same person that I was, and I am compelled to share everything His Spirit is teaching me.

 

Has this transformation been easy? No, following Him means choosing the difficult way. When I feel the weakest He Is my Strength. I obediently love my enemies and bless those who curse me. I swallow my pride and humbly trust the perfect way of our Spiritual Father.

 

How great and how awesome and almighty is our amazing God!!  We don’t have to like it or even understand it, we only need to believe enough to trust in His ability to turn the pain and adversity of this life into the very thing that produces the beauty of His Eternal Spirit in us.

 

For our light and momentary affliction is producing for us an eternal glory that is far beyond comparison, 2 Corinthians 4:17

 

More than that, we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope…Romans 5:3, 4

 

I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us, Romans 8:18

 

No difficulty has overtaken you that is not common to man.  But God is faithful not to let you be tested beyond your ability to endure, with the test He will provide the way out, that you may be able to bear it patiently. 1 Corinthians 10:13

 

Dear friends, do not be surprised at the painful trails you are suffering, as though something strange were happening to you.  But rejoice that you participate in the sufferings of Christ so you may be over joyed when His glory is revealed. 1 Peter 4:12

 

The Lord is close to those with a broken and contrite, (penitent, truly and humbly repentant) heart. Psalm 34:18

 

The sacrifices that please God are a broken and contrite heart. Psalm 51:17

 

“They overcame him, (the accuser) by the blood of the Lamb and by the word of their testimony; they did not love their lives so much as to shrink from death.” Revelation 12:11

 

His Love is True, Everlasting, Healing and Transforming. It’s what drew me out of my bondage of deception and taught me what dying to myself really meant. I wanted the easy way, and my goal was to be happy. I was always rushed, stressed, exhausted and running on empty. I just kept spiraling downward, on a path that seemed so normal.

 

All the noise, confusion and disorder was drowning out The Voice of Peace, saying; relax, just wait, come and rest with me, be still and know that I am God, slow down, be slow to speak and quick to listen, in quietness and trust is where I renew your strength. 

 

He restores my soul when I sit and soak in His Love. It cover a multitude of sin, and in His presence Is fullness of joy!

Thank You For Your Love

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This love I know-because you taught me.

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My spirit sings-with joy in Your embrace.

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I bow my soul to You in worship,

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   and the Merciful Compassion of Your Face.

  

Chorus  

I thank You for my new heart,

With the hardness gone

I can feel Your Spirits touch.

I thank You for my new song,

May Your Name be known so the world can sing along.