When a person reaches this place referred to as “middle age”, it becomes much easier to reflect on the tapestry of your life. For instance, I can now see where God played this subtle but constant role in my life even though I had no one speaking or mentoring me in that direction. It’s interesting the things we can recall with clarity if we really try.
- My parents threatened to get rid of my dog, JoJo, when I was in the 5th grade. I remember snatching JoJo and taking him to the cemetery mausoleum just behind our house and sitting on the cold marble steps and praying out loud to God to not let that happen. JoJo got a reprieve and died under my parents orange tree when I was about 22.
- During the time I was in middle and high school, our home literally backed up to a church. I remember asking my parents from time to time to go and, occasionally, my dad would cave in and take me. I loved everything about it~ the choir robes, the young minister, the pews, the bibles… but I had no one to lead me.
- When I was 17, I was in a pretty serious car accident. I was the driver and it was entirely negligent; driven by dumb decisions and a laissez faire attitude that I was immune from consequences from my actions. Because I was hospitalized at a Catholic hospital, a priest or nun came by my room a few times and the conviction I felt by their very presence was enough to take my breath away. They were kind~ it was my own spirit in rebellion that caused the conviction in me….but I had no one to lead me and drifted.
- When I was 27, my very best Navy girlfriend lost her husband in a helicopter accident. It rocked my world. I distinctly remember this urge to chase after God~ for answers and for peace. I drove myself to a Catholic church, bought every book written for the new believer and got to work. I was baptized the following Easter vigil candlelight service.
- My children went to parochial school and we dutifully attended mass but that connection was missing. Again, I found myself surrounded by “believers” but I didn’t really know anyone who was studying the bible daily or who had any sense of what deep relationship was and so I drifted and stayed there for several years.
- Then, one day, I visited a non-denominational church when I had moved back to Tampa and had this bizarre notion I HAD to work there. It’s easy now to recognize that God was moving big time and preparing me for more than I could have imagined but, at the time, I thought I had lost my mind and so did everyone who knew me. By the grace of God, I was hired and was exposed to a portion of Christianity I hadn’t known existed. Slowly, I began to change from the inside. It wasn’t easy and it wasn’t always pretty. God put me right where I needed to be because He knew the really tragic things that I’d have to walk through personally. Had I not been in that church with these people who poured into me, the continual battles I had within a dysfunctional marriage would have done me in. I had learned just enough of what God had for me that I held on by a thread through those days and most people didn’t even know the depth of my despair.
- And then I thought the marriage had healed and I became complacent. I longed for more but my spouse didn’t share that longing and it became just another thing that caused a deep valley between us. The closer I’d press into God, the more my family wouldn’t understand me. It was a constant internal and external struggle. Most of the time, I put God on a shelf and behaved like I thought people expected me to and, frankly, do what was the easiest.
- And then. Ugh. And then. Only God could have seen. My dad became ill and passed away. My (ex) husband finally threw in the towel and physically moved out. Somehow, all of that happened between December and April and the family I had loved and devoted my life to had ended. Just like that. My family of origin would never again be the same without my dad. My family and marriage of over 3 decades was splintered and our little fearless foursome family were living in 4 different places. That, too, would never be the same. The eventual realization that we would never again celebrate holidays as a family or live life as we always had drove me to make a choice at what MY life would look like….. and this, friends, was the turning point.
I could either dive head first into an icy margarita and call everyone I knew who would gladly provide me with more than one OR I could do the “hard” thing. I could find people who were living the right way and chasing God like I had wanted to all along. The choice was easier now that I didn’t feel this need to be who people wanted me to be. Suddenly, I could eat cereal for dinner and go to church on a Sunday night. I could enroll in bible college and spend time with girlfriends. I could volunteer for Saturday church events and spend careless hours in Barnes & Noble. I could do anything I wanted without the daily task of having dinner on the table at 7pm or waking up at 5:30am to pack a lunch. I could do what I felt led to do.
And thank God I did.
And you can, too. Don’t wait for the catastrophic event in your life to do what God has been telling you to do.
What has happened since that decision, over the course of just over two years now, is miraculous. Wait until you read what God did this past week….. more tomorrow.
Be blessed.
