Let the story begin:
I went to a basketball
game with a friend when I was 12. I was just coming into my own at that time.
Lacking confidence in all areas, I was making up for it with false bravado and
turning wild. I was so concerned about my weight I was already taking cross
tops, black mollies and any other “speeding” pill I could get my hands on. Not
every day yet, but experimenting nonetheless. Speed helped me keep my weight
down and gave me WAY more energy. I was also experimenting with smoking. Takes a lot of babysitting to support these habits
of errant youth.
At the game a tall,
gangly boy came onto the court. I told my friend that I was going to marry him.
She laughed and pointed out that I did not even know his name. Who cared? I knew
I was going to marry him. It was several years before she reminded me of that
day, by that time I not only knew his name, he had moved to my high school and
we were planning on getting married which we did when we were 19.
Things did not go well
for us. He came from a completely different background—a single, bartender mom
next to my married and still crazy about each other upper middle class family. My expectations did not meet with his
experiences. I wanted “Father Knows Best” he wanted “Bachelor Party”.
One night he came home,
said he was sick of the whole marriage thing and he was going out. That was
code for, “I am going out with the guys. I will get drunk, pick up some woman
and either come home tomorrow morning right before work or not at all”. Usually
he came home, started a fight and then had his excuse to go out. This was
different. This time he said he did not want to be married. He didn’t want to
deal with kids and dinners at home. He wanted the freedom of being single and hanging
out with his friends whenever he wanted and yet he wanted a wife when he needed
one for his career and or convenience. He did not want a divorce but didn’t
know what he wanted so he changed and left.
It wasn’t really that
simple. There was screaming, recriminations, tears, cursing, fit throwing,
shoving and slamming doors. I don’t remember too much beyond my heart breaking
and intense, red hot anger rising up. I was tired of all the cheating, lying,
drinking and being told in complete military style that the Army did not issue
him a wife so a wife was really not important in the grand scheme of things
called life.
I had my ouzo in hand.
Let’s talk about that little addition to my life. Ouzo is licorice flavored
liquor. I was tired of most drinks and never did like a lot of them. Not a beer
drinker (after we left Germany anyway) no beer, no Jaegermeister anymore. I had
gotten drunk on Alabama Daisies (vodka in the freezer mixed with icy cold
raspberry wine a fruit flavored slushy that knocked me on my butt) once and gotten
pregnant with Jason which was my only wine experience. Loved gin in a salty dog
but it had started giving me a headache and how much tequila can a person drink
anyway? So I drank Ouzo. I mixed it with water which turned it cloudy--like
skim milk. That was it—this lactose intolerant mom had “mommy’s milk” whenever
she wanted! It was potent, tasted good and I drank it a lot. (“A lot” is a
theme in my life—I tend to do things to the fullest!)
So here I sat on the
couch with my ouzo in hand and a cigarette burning, (remember the “a lot”
theme? I smoked 5 packs a day so I always had a cigarette burning...) angry and
making plans for the future without a husband and raising my 2 children, Jason
and Jenny. Jason with his anti-military
long hair came to sit by me. We were close. He was extremely intelligent and we
talked a lot. I had my left arm on the back of the couch and as was his way he
snuggled up to my side with his head lying against me so I would put my arm
around him. Jenny was already asleep and this was our time to hang out
together.
He started talking as
soon as he got settled, “Mom, I have the best thing to tell you.”
“Really?” I replied
automatically, “What it is?” I checked my watch. His bedtime was 7. We were a
military family who got up early! He had 25 minutes, 25 minutes before I could
break down and cry because my heart was broken, 25 minutes until I could drink
myself into a stupor, just 25 minutes to act normal so he would not know
something was wrong.
He cut into my thoughts.
“Well there was this man. His name was Jesus.” That line really put my thoughts
onto a roll because I did not believe there was very much good concerning that
name. The name Jesus worked for a swear word but other than that I was sure it
was useless. I was not even sure there was a God. I had studied a lot of other
ways to live a better life but this Jesus stuff was something else. Jason went
on. I always tried listen to him—he would catch me when I did not--so I cut my
negative mental ranting off and began to listen again.
“He came all the way
from Heaven to earth to live and then these bad men nailed him on a cross and
then they put Him in a cave with a big rock and the rock rolled away and there
was an angel and Jesus went to heaven and now we can be saved and go to heaven
with Him.” One breath—very Jason-like. He knew to get to the point and tell it
all before some adult interrupted him.
“That is a very nice
story Jason but you are too young to understand how any of this works. Religion
is something you can study when you get older. There is Judaism, Buddhism,
Islam, Hinduism, so many things to choose from. You do not have to make a
decision not about anything now. Besides I don’t believe that story.”
“No mom,” he wailed and
then without a breath he continued, “You don’t understand…Jesus lived in
heaven. His mom’s name was Mary. He got born in a barn, then when He was bigger
he did miracles and then some bad men nailed him to a cross and the whole sky
got black and He died then they put Him in a cave and put a big rock in front
of it. The rock moved and an angel was there. Then Jesus went to talk to His
friends and then He went to heaven so we could come live there. We can get saved
and then we get to go heaven with Him.” I really needed to teach him to
breathe.
“That is very nice Jason
but YOU don’t understand. You are just too young for this and I am not
interested.” My already Mike-triggered temper was barely boiling below the
surface so it did not take much for that temper to start rising again and I stated,
“There is no reason to talk about this. You are too young and I don’t believe
in Jesus anyway.”
He was not intimidated.
He knew my temper better than anyone but he continued on anyway, “Jeremy (his
friend who lived down the street) is only 4 and he believes in Jesus. He got
saved so he gets to go to heaven. Call his mom, Liz, she will tell you.”
“Great”, I thought, “I
can solve this right now.” While I am
dialing Jeremy’s mom I glance at my watch over Jason’s head, 10 minutes--this
has gone on for 10 minutes! But, I only have 15 minutes left before he goes to
bed and I can fall apart. How did we get into this discussion anyway? Why won’t
he drop it? Why does he get on a topic and need to know everything about it
before he lets it go?
“Hi Liz.” I did not need
to tell her who I was, we talked every day. “I need to talk to you about
something. Jason keeps telling me about this Jesus story. Apparently Jeremy
told him…..”
She interrupted in a
very uncharacteristic manner. “I bet. Jeremy is so excited! He received Christ
as hiss savior this summer and my dad baptized him when we were there. You see, Jesus was in heaven with God but He
knew that man was dying so His Father sent Him to earth as a baby. He lived
without sin, performed miracles, healed people, and made the religious people
mad. They had Him crucified. That way He could take our sins on the cross. He
was crucified to pay for our sins so we would be able to believe in him and
have eternal life. He went to hell for 3 days then rose again and now we can
receive Him and have eternal life.”
My mind was racing, “Geeze,
what was with these people don’t they breathe?” Instead I said, “Jason is barely
5 he is not old enough to have ‘sinned’.”
Liz did not hesitate,
“Oh the Bible says we have all sinned and come short of the glory of God.”
What the heck did that
mean? I took another tack, “Don’t you think they are too young to make a
decision like this? Don’t you think they should wait until they are older to
make those types of decisions?”
She did not hesitate, “No,
I don’t. When they are old enough to realize what Jesus did for them they are
old enough to make that decision. Jason understands the reality of what Christ
did for him—he and Jeremy talk about it a lot.”
Great. I feel totally
boxed in. “I still don’t think they are old enough to understand but I will
talk to him. Thanks Liz.” She was no help at all. I should have known. She
tried to talk to me about Jesus and salvation several times and I refused to
listen. I just told her I was a Christian—I knew she did not believe me but
what could she say?
I had not heard this
“Jesus story” 3 times in 15 minutes and I just want Jason to go to bed….why did
I teach him to tell time so young? When he was younger I could fudge 10 or 15
minutes on his bedtime when I needed to be alone or to escape pain through some
chemical method…now he just looks at the clock.
I take a deep breath, “Ok
Jason, Liz says you understand so you can do what you want I guess. I don’t
think you are old enough and should wait. But, I will support your decision and
you can do what you want.” I am basking in pride that I am such a progressive
mom. A mom who supports her 5 year-old’s decisions.
He jumps right on that, “Ok
mom let’s pray.”
I was totally shocked.
“Jason I have no intentions of praying. I don’t even believe in this stuff.”
He was not deterred, “Don’t
you want to go to heaven? You can go to heaven if you ask Jesus into your
heart.”
“I don’t believe in
heaven.” was my self-righteous response.
“But mom, there was this
guy named Jesus…”
“Don’t tell me this
story again.” I almost shouted, “I am not praying. I do not believe in this. I
think you are too young and I do not want to talk about it anymore.”
You can only imagine the
silence. It even made the self-righteous me uncomfortable. I knew he was hurt
but I could not deal with this right now and he was just a child. He would
forget about it by tomorrow. I thought we were done—only about 5 or 6 minutes left
before he went to bed. I lit yet another cigarette and sat there enjoying the
silence and yet totally uncomfortable in that same silence.
Jason snuggled up even
tighter against my side. He quietly put his small hand on my knee, looked up at
me and said, “It’s OK mom. I love you so much I will go to hell with you.”
My heart shattered yet
again. Here was this child I adored. This child who knew how evil I could be.
How hatefully I could talk. How mean I could be. How very horrible I was and
yet he loved me. I felt like a cloud had been rolled back. It was like a fog had
parted over my head—a light came on—I had an understanding—call it what you
want--I completely understood for the first time ever that if this child could
love me like he just said there had to be a God somewhere that knew me and yet
loved me—me, yes me. It was too much to take in but through my tears I said, “I
don’t want you to go to hell and I love you too, so I’ll pray with you and we’ll
go to heaven.”
Jason, in very Jason-like
fashion said, “Ok, you pray and I will follow.”
I was stunned, “Jas, I
don’t know how to pray.”
Without hesitation he
said, “Call Liz, she will give you the words.”
Great, here we go
again—this is kind of embarrassing. My mind is racing and pride is driving the
whole thing. Liz will know I prayed. I am a pretty private person and even
though I do not really understand what is happening I know SOMETHING is
happening and I do not want to talk about it to anyone other than Jason.
Swearing was involved here but I called.
“Hi Liz, Jason wants to
pray to get saved,” I chuckled. “You know how stubborn he can be when he gets
his mind set. Anyway,” I, too, can get into this talk-really-fast-and-do-not-take-a-breath-so-no-one-else-can-get-a-word-in-edgewise
“we need to know what we are supposed to say.”
Liz probably knew better
than to shout “Praise God” though I found out later that she had been praying
for me for a long time. Instead in her very gentle way she said, “You just talk
to Him. You tell Him that you know He came, died for your sins and rose again.
Ask Him to forgive those sins and to come into your heart.” It is just that
easy.
I asked her, “Do we have
to do anything weird—like the lotus position or get on our knees or anything?”
“Not unless you want
to.” she chuckled.
I laughed out of
nervousness, thanked her and got off the phone. Even though time had been so
important to me 20 minutes before that was before all of this started. Now time
seemed to have stopped. I was oblivious to that but not to the fact that I was
getting ready to pray and here I was drinking and smoking so I moved the drink,
put my cigarette in the ashtray and moved that too. Not far mind you, maybe 6
inches. To my heathen mind I guess I thought God would not see it then???
I told Jason what Liz
had said and told him to go ahead. My child who loved me so very much said,
“No, I will pray after you.” He was determined to get me in heaven. “Ok, here
we go.”
I started, “God, if you
are really up there…”
Jason, never one to have
his enthusiasm dampened by my negativity in any circumstance, followed in his
very own way, “God I am so glad you are in heaven…”
Well,
this praying thing was not really what I had in mind for the evening but
getting drunk was what I had had in mind and that would happen right after
Jason went to bed so I might as well get this over with, “forgive my sins…”
“I am so sorry I sinned,
please forgive me and help me be a better boy. Thank you for Jesus who came all
the way to earth for me...” His enthusiasm was cute and yet off putting in a
way I could not describe.
I continued, “Uuuhhh, come
into my heart”
“Me too Jesus, we want
to go to heaven with you!”
In a flash I felt like
the lights came on, colors were brighter, the air was clearer, everything
changed. I knew that I knew that I knew that God was real, Jesus was living in
me and EVERYTHING had changed in my life forever! There is no other way to
describe it. Nothing had really changed physically—the lights had already been
on—but it had ALL changed. That fog that I thought had lifted when Jason told
me he would go to hell with me completely left the room. It was so weird.
While I was trying to
take it all in Jason threw his arms around my neck and told me he loved me.
“Isn’t this exciting?” He jumped off the couch and was bouncing all over the
place. I was trying to figure out where all the light came from and how it was
that everything was so different.
Eventually Jason calmed
down somewhat and I got him to bed. I could hear him from his room telling God
all kinds of things. He was talking to Jesus like He was Jeremy. I asked him to
be quiet and go to sleep. He told me he couldn’t he was too excited. He did try
to get quieter though.
In the meantime, I was completely
stunned. I sat on the couch trying to figure all this out. It was like a dark
cloud had been removed from my eyes. Blue was bluer. Red was redder. The lamps
were brighter. Something had broken in the spirit realm. If LSD had been in my
past I would have thought this was a flashback. It was totally over my head. I
had had a Bible when I lived at home so I looked for it…no such luck. Then I
remembered these little green Bibles all the Army guys have in their TA 50. I
pulled Mike’s duffle out of the cupboard and dumped it on the floor. Everything
was packed in there a certain way. I did not care—let him deal with it—I just
wanted that Bible. There it was in the bottom. I was enough afraid of Mike’s
anger that I did throw everything back into the duffel and put it away. He
would wonder at the condition of everything but I would cover that when we got
there.
I sat down with that
little green New Testament and knew this book would change my life. I looked it
over and realized I had no trouble talking to God—I just talked to Him like He
was my best friend sitting there with me. I did not know what prayer was, I
only knew I could talk to God about whatever I wanted. And, I talked a lot.
“OK God, I have studied
lots of religions and they all have flawed books. I have always heard the Bible
is supposed to be true. As soon as I find something that isn’t, I am giving up
on you. But, I am not going to look for errors either. I do not care who
translated, I will believe you are big enough to get what You wanted into this
book. I figure if You can create the universe and make this light thing that
happened to me then You can get the stuff You want into this book. That is the deal God; I am going to believe it
all. Unless I find out that you lied, then I am done with You.”
I started reading. Let
me just say I did not absorb it all but I was a fairly fast reader and this is
a small book so I figured 1 or 2 hours and I should be done and know all I need
to….I overestimated my abilities.
Around 10 I heard a
knock on the door. I could not believe how much time had passed. I had been so
concerned about time earlier. Liz opened the door and came in. She took one
look at me and said, “You did it, you got saved!” She was so excited!
I didn’t know about that
but I did know that Jesus was in my heart. “How do you know?”
“You look completely
different!” She almost shouted at me in her excitement.
She came in and we began
to talk. I told her Mike left and I did not think he was coming back. She told me
God could take care of that. Now, this was good news. I was so excited.
“How?” I asked her.
“We will pray.” Then she
told me a little about her own life.
Her dad was a Baptist
preacher (I understood a little about this because my mom took me to the
Baptist church when I was little. Somehow it never “took” though.) She talked
about some people called Charles and Frances Hunter. She and her husband, Tony went
to see them in Tacoma. Tony and Liz were the love story I wanted when I married
Mike. They were child hood sweethearts. They got married before she finished
high school and were still crazy about each other. I longed for a marriage like
theirs. Mine did not even come close.
She said while the Hunters were speaking they
said if you wanted “more” of Jesus to come on down to the front and they would
pray for you. Liz took off like a flash. Tony was more hesitant but he felt God
tell him that he would lose her if he didn’t follow so he did. On the way she
fell asleep in the floor (this was how she explained it to me—later we learned
she was slain in the spirit) and so did Tony. She said, “I am not sure exactly
what happened but I think it is in Acts 2. My daddy never taught on this.” She
went on, “With the life you have led you will need all the help you can get so
throw your arms up in the air and tell God you want ‘all He’s got’.” And so I
did.
I threw my hands up in
the air and said, “Give me all you got God.” I thought there were changes
before when I prayed and asked Jesus into my heart but with this short prayer I
knew something even more powerful had happened. I felt infused with power. I was
dumbfounded at what was going on and all the bravado I used to conceal my
insecurities dissipated. Liz let me know that I would talk funny. She didn’t
know that much about it yet but thought it was called “speaking in other
tongues”. She told me to read the book of Acts and I would figure it out.
We talked about Mike. I
poured my heart out. I had loved him since I was 15. I could not image my life
without him. I was totally disappointed in my life but still did not want to
raise my children without him. I loved
him.
She said, “Nothing is too big for God.” That
planted deeply in my heart and I have come back to that statement thousands of
times over the years. I sat quietly and waited for her to pray.
She wouldn’t. “It’s your
marriage. You want him back. You pray and I will agree with you.”
I cried, I refused, I
was embarrassed and afraid.
“If you want your
marriage, tell God.” She would not back down.
I finally did. I prayed
a huge, spiritually insightful, powerful prayer. “God, bring him back.” That
was it. Nothing more but I knew He would bring Mike back.
Liz said she had several
books I should read so we took off to her house to get them. She just lived a
couple of doors away. Even the stars
were brighter. I packed up a paper grocery bag full of books included in that
bag were a couple by those people she had gone to see, Charles and Frances
Hunter also known as The Happy Hunters.
I hurried home. I wanted to read them all but I wanted to finish the New
Testament first.
As soon as I got home I
lit another cigarette and got another drink. I would turn away from the Bible to
take a puff every time—somewhere in my mind I thought God would be offended if
I smoked and read the Bible at the same time so I turned aside. Where is the
reasoning in that? I did the same whenever I took a sip of ouzo. I now know
that as crazy as it was, it was the beginning of a conscience. The beginning of
hearing. The beginning of a new life. The beginning of refining. The beginning
of so many things. The beginning of life.
For years I had had
migraines. The last one I had prior to this was the worst one ever. It lasted 2
weeks. I went to the hospital 5 times and wanted to die. Mike was in the field
at the time and Jason who was 4 years old at the time and Jenny who was not
quite 2 took care of me. While I was
reading I could feel a headache starting. Fear gripped me. I tried to ignore it
but I could feel that band of pain tightening. Nausea was starting and my eyes
started aching. This was never going to work because the lights were still
brighter than I had ever seen. I had just read several scriptures about
healing.
There was no better time
than the present to see if the Bible was true. If He was some powerful God who
ran out of power when Jesus died then there was no sense in starting all this Christian
stuff. Let me just insert here that I could—and did—cuss the paint off the
wall. “Stuff” was not in my vocabulary at that time but it is not in the best
interest of the reader to be that accurate here. I realized how much I swore at
this point and asked God to change my language. Remember I am just talking to
Him like He is a good friend sitting on the couch with me. So, as this headache
is building and I am reading that Jesus healed “all” who came to Him I came to
Him. Again, I came with the simplest of prayers, “God if your power still works
and the Bible is really true, heal this headache and I do not ever want to have
another headache.” Just that quick I saw some weird monkey-looking thing with
its arms around my head leave. No more headache. Gone immediately! Too strange!
Unbelievable! I shook my head. No pain! I knew about demons from studying
witchcraft, spells and various religions. I had no idea these headaches could
be a demon, but that had to be what I saw.
Wow! This was going to
be great! God is awesome and this was going to be a trip.
And, it has…..
He told me to look again at the ocean, the debris. This is
what happens to your past when you walk into the refining of my love and follow
it with the washing of the word. The debris breaks loose and washes away. At
this point it is just debris. You can gather it up and try to regrow it. You
can build an altar to it. Or, you can see it as debris, recognize it as what it
is—trash. You don’t live need to live in trash. You do not need to decorate
with the trash. It stinks and if you try to salvage it you will carry the same
stench. 
