Learning to Live and Love the Person God Created You to Be

     So the majority of the words in this post are not mine. The thoughts, however, most certainly are. I just happened upon an author who puts my thoughts into much better words than I ever could. I have been trying to find a way to word these exact sentiments for 9 months now... Ever since God orchestrated a series of events that forced me, in a beautifully frightening way, to see and experience a new way of living.... A series of events that forever changed how I live my life. I cried big, ugly, snivelly-nosed, wail-accompanied tears when I read this last chapter of "The Gifts of Imperfection" by Brene' Brown. Brown is a psychology researcher who researches ..... wait for it..... shame. That's right. A life dedicated to researching shame. Yikes! As frightening as it sounded to me, it sounded even more intriguing. And so I read. And re-read. And have all but memorized the last chapter. This chapter validated me, to me (if that makes any sense). It made me cry because I was finally able to  say, "I'm not crazy. Somebody besides Jesus and Paul get it!! This woman understands me!! And I'm okay!! How I am choosing to live is a good thing!!!"
      Thank you, Lord, for this "hug on paper". I needed that. So here it is:


 excerpt from The Gifts of Imperfection, by Brene' Brown

" I think most of us have developed a fairly sensitive bull#$&@ meter when it comes to reading self-help books. I think this is a good thing. There are too many books that make promises they can't keep or make change sound so much easier than it is. The truth is that meaningful change is a process. It can be uncomfortable and is often risky, especially when we're talking about embracing our imperfections, cultivating authenticity, and looking the world in the eye and saying, I am enough. However afraid we are of change, the question that we must ultimately answer is this: What's the greater risk? Letting go of what people think or letting go of how I feel, what I believe, and who I am? Wholehearted living is about engaging in our lives from a place of worthiness. It's about cultivating the courage, compassion, and connection to wake up in the morning and think, No matter what gets done and how much is left undone, I am enough. It is going to bed at night thinking, Yes, I am imperfect and vulnerable and sometimes afraid, but that doesn't change the truth that I am also brave and worthy of love and belonging. It makes sense to me that the gifts of imperfection are courage, compassion, and connection, because when I think back to my life before this work, I remember often feeling fearful, judgmental, and alone - the opposite of the gifts. I wondered, What if I can't keep all of these balls in the air? Why isn't everyone else working harder and living up to my expectations? What will people think if I fail or give up? When can I stop proving myself to everyone? For me, the risk of losing myself felt far more dangerous than the risk of letting people see the real me. It's been close to four years since that day in 2006, when God got a hold of me. It's been the best four years of my life, and I wouldn't change a thing. It was tough, but I'm hard-headed. I guess God needed a way to get my attention. I'm not at all sure that this work is about self-help. I think of it as an invitation to join a Wholehearted revolution. A small, quiet, grassroots movement that starts with each of us saying, My story matters because I matter. A movement where we can take to the streets with our messy, imperfect, wild, stretch-marked, wonderful, heartbreaking, grace-filled, and joyful lives. A movement fueled by the freedom that comes when we stop pretending that everything is okay when it isn't. A call that rises up from our bellies when we find the courage to celebrate those intensely joyful moments even though we've convinced ourselves that savoring happiness is inviting disaster. "Revolution" might sound a little dramatic, but in this world, choosing authenticity and worthiness is an absolute act of resistance. Choosing to live and love with our whole hearts is an act of defiance. You're going to confuse, piss off, and terrify lots of people - including yourself. One minute you'll pray that the transformation stops, and the next minute you'll pray that it never ends. You'll also wonder how you can feel so brave and so afraid at the same time. At least that's how I feel most of the time...brave, afraid, and very, very alive."

"Working out your faith..." and it IS work!

"I love you, Jenny. I love you very, very much. You have no concept..." This is what I hear very first thing when I start my quiet time with the Lord each day. It's just proof that God knows exactly what I need to hear before going into a time of talking and listening to Him. He does love me, and that is something I have to hear from Him daily, as I have a difficult time believing it. My past experiences have led me to believe that love is very conditional and temporal. I suppose this is why I make absolutely certain that I love others with as unconditional a love and as committed a love as I can muster.

Lately I have struggled with the listening portion of my quiet time. I'm not really sure I want to hear what the Lord has to say. The last time He prompted me to do something during my quiet time, the fallout was tremendous. It has caused strife between myself and my husband, and it had me thinking I was absolutely out of my mind to do what I did. In spite of the fact that we are having major financial problems, I was prompted to quit my job and trust that He would provide for the missing income. The next day I did just that. The Lord has since shown me a few reasons why I was to do this which I won't, for time's sake, go into today. In other words, God has honored my obedience. So why the difficulty with the listening portion of my devotion when I know God is faithful?

Being willing to listen to God and do his will is VERY scary. Period. Even when you believe He loves you. Even when you believe He is faithful. Even when you believe. I am deathly afraid to hear what he has for me next because it may mean I need to take a giant leap of faith again, and I don't want to go through the emotional torment of obedience even one more time. I know I am not alone in this. It seems the more obedient I am, the more afraid I am to be obedient. But, "I love you. I love you more than you will ever know. You have no concept..." keeps playing in my mind, and reassuring me at the beginning of every quiet time that He has my best interests at heart. And so I proceed ever so cautiously, with eyes squeezed shut, truly working out my faith "in fear and trembling." And just this morning I am reminded of Paul's letter to Timothy in 2 Timothy 1:6-7: "For this reason I remind you to fan into flame the gift of God, which is in you through the laying on of my hands, for God gave us a spirit not of fear, but of power and love and self-control."

So I "Press on...", praying the entire time that God would not make it too terribly hard on me, but knowing the entire time that difficulty doesn't matter. Obedience. Now, that is what matters.

I just don't know if I can do it.

I have a friend. Well, she was a friend. She doesn't have many real friends. Oh, she has a ton of FB friends, and lots of acquaintances, but no REAL friends that I know of. You know, the kinds of friends you can share anything with, cry with, laugh with, etc.. She prefers to keep people at arms length, under the guise of God and husband being the only truly intimate relationships one should have. It's like she feels she is cheating on God to have a close friendship. A long story short, I was the first close friend she had had in a long time, if ever. October 20th we were planning a coffee date. October 21st she stopped responding to any of my attempts to contact her. On Nov. 6th she unfriended me on FB and texted me, "Be well. God bless" That is the last I have heard from her.
Needless to say, I was very hurt. This happened at the worst possible time - I was already having major family issues, so I was as angry about the ill timing of her unexplainable departure as I was hurt. I implored her to explain what I did wrong and asked her to allow me the opportunity to apologize if I did something to hurt her. No response. As best I can figure it, I got too close and she got spooked. Remember - she keeps folks at arm's length. I also suspected her of having an eating disorder (it takes one to know one), and she may have figured that out. If you've ever known someone with an eating disorder, you know the last thing they are going to do is admit it. They'd just as soon punt you as to face you when you know the dirty little secret.

I mourned the loss of this friendship for over two months. Mourned it like a death. Anyone with sense told me, "Just let it go." And I finally have. I have turned the page and moved on to the next chapter in my life. As much as I have been allowed.

You see, God has healed me of the hurt. I am no longer mourning. I no longer desire to try to rekindle this friendship. But, while turning to the Lord in times of need is the best possible thing one can do, it comes with risks. There is always the chance that the Lord's response to your desire is not the response that you hoped for. At this point, I just want to move on completely. Forget it ever happened. Ya know,a new year, "May auld acquaintance be forgot, and never come to mind...", and all that good stuff. But while God has answered my prayer and healed the hurt, he has not turned me loose of her tail, which is what I really wanted. God has let me know, in many, many ways, that even if I never hear from her again, I am to stay in contact with her for now, no matter how painful that may be. Let her know, through cards and messages, that I still love her, that God loves her ,that I am still there for her, and that I pray for her daily. For how long? How often? I have no idea. Stupid, right? Anyone with half a brain would figure I just can't let go. That I am obsessed. Believe me, more than anything in the world I want to be 100% done with her. It would be SO much easier that way. But more than that, I want what God wants. I just don't know if I can do it. It's gonna hurt.

One of the most difficult questions to answer in Christian work is, "What are you going to do?" You don't know what you are going to do. The only thing you know is that God knows what He is doing. And God does not tell you what He is going to do - He reveals to you who He is. What I know of Him from this experience so far: He is merciful, forgiving, loving, working in others' lives, and working in my life.

In Hebrews 11:8, Paul describes the "heroes of the faith". Of Abraham, he said, "He went out, not knowing where He was going." (Heb. 11:8). Have you ever "gone out" in this way? If so, you know there is no logical answer possible when anyone asks you what you are doing. In the words of Oswald Chambers, we are to "...continually examine our attitude toward God to see if we are willing to "go out" in every area of our life, trusting in God entirely....Do you believe in a miracle-working God, and will you "go out" in complete surrender to Him until you are not surprised one iota by anything He does?" I am trying, but I just don't know if I can. I can't, but God can. And that is the key. To take it one day at a time with Him. He will give me the strength to do it when it needs to be done. And that's all that matters.

Prayers appreciated. And I hope that, in this New Year, you will "go out" in God's will, however blindly. There is a certain freedom to it... I will keep you all posted.

Oaks of Righteous

‎"... and provide for those who grieve in Zion to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor." Isaiah 61:3

God has been bringing this scripture to my mind over and over the last couple of weeks. Interestingly enough, I inadvertantly memorized it, and I usually have a TERRIBLE time memorizing scripture even when I try. Have you ever felt like God is giving you a Word, a promise, to hang on to because He knows you'll need it? The part about "being oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor" has permeated my very soul this week as I take a huge step of faith in becoming that oak of righteousness. God has been leading me and preparing me for years to work in some form or fashion with survivors of sexual abuse, and I have recently felt lead to discuss the possibility of starting a ministry to this end in my church. Don't know if church is ultimately the place for this, but it's a place to start investigating, as it has potential.

See, here's the deal. God doesn't allow us to go through a bunch of crap (for lack of a better word)and come out the other end in one piece so that we can simply be grateful. We are meant to be growing plants of the mercy and grace - His mercy and grace - that He bestowed upon us in our time of greatest need (Is. 61:3). "Growing" implies action. We can't be the "oaks of righteousness" God wants us to be if we refuse to let Him grow us into them. It can be scary, as often times it means we leave our comfort zones and step up for God in ways only possible with His help. For those of us with unstable childhoods, leaving our comfort zone is the LAST thing we want to do. It took us SO LONG to find our comfort zones that, now that we are finally comfy, we want to stay that way. But leave them we must. We have a story to tell with a terrible beginning but with a glorious ending that the whole world needs to hear! If He gave us "beauty for ashes", He will do it for anyone who calls on His name. People need to know that incredible news! And who better to tell them than one who has walked a mile in their shoes. I challenge you today, are you allowing God to do all He can through you to bring others to Him?

Let's Try This Again

So I started this blog last year with the intention of posting weekly. And then I didn't. I have since felt lead to blow the dust off of it and start posting. What I would really love is for this blog, eventually, to be a forum where people can speak freely on the taboo subjects of homosexuality and abuse. I know what it's like to be scared to share, to feel others may not believe you, or to feel as if you'll be judged. But if that's your history, and God is showing you a better way, I'd love to know, and who knows? Maybe someone else can benefit from your comments. I hope that in reading my posts you will see how God can heal the hurt, and how God can work in the life of someone who's been broken to bits. As it says in Isaiah, Jesus came to "bind up the brokenhearted". I'm no one special. If He did it for me, he will do it for you.

My Testimony

My Testimony

Folks will tell you that love is a feeling. I beg to differ. Love is a decision. In the words of my pastor Buddy Gray, "Nothing you can ever do will make God love you more, and nothing you can ever do will make God love you less." And as you will see, I am the perfect object lesson for this statement.



I didn't always understand love. My parents divorced when I was 6 yrs. old. I was told at one time that my father simply didn't want to be a father anymore. This was the beginning of my concept of God. The Bible says God is a father, and apparently some fathers don't want to be fathers. My best guess was that I had done something to make my Dad want to give up fatherhood, so I started on my lifelong journey of being good to make him love me. Being good to earn his love, and being good to earn God's. Being the oldest child in a single parent home, I pressured myself to be the missing parent for my sister. I felt personally responsible for her well-being. I also pressured myself to do well in school (straight "A"s were all that was acceptable), and I became the poster child for excellent behavior, both at school and at home. I never wanted to be a burden to my mother. She had enough burdens of her own, what with raising us alone and trying to make ends meet. I managed pretty well for a couple of years, then 1979 happened.



I was 8 years old, and my father, with whom I had had a reasonable relationship to this point, was mistakenly shot in the head. The bullet went completely through one man's head killing him, and then got lodged in my father's brain. He was in a coma for at least a couple of months. When he regained consciousness, he had little long term memory and no short term memory. My father, who was an extremely intelligent man, had to watch Sesame Street daily to relearn letters and numbers. Everything in his room was labeled. It was like working with a kindergartener. He wasn't expected to survive, so praise be to God, he has done remarkably well. He has regained much of his long-term memory, and managed to hold down a simple job here and there. He was also instrumental in getting the Brady Bill passed in the 1980s (anti-gun legislation). Unfortunately, his "accident" took it's toll in other ways. Dad was easily frustrated with his extremely slow progress. He turned to alcohol, I'm assuming to relieve the psychological pain. He also had an explosive, unpredictable temper I had never seen before. As a little girl, I was afraid of him, however, he still had visitation rights. He agreed to see us girls at his mother's, as his judgement and caretaking abilities were impaired, and he needed another adult to be ultimately responsible for our well-being. I didn't want to see him. But I didn't want to rock the boat, so I kept quiet.


I'm still not sure why the sexual abuse started. I choose to believe that my dad didn't realize what he was doing. His brain simply wasn't working right. What I know for sure is that he never acted as if he remembered abusing me the day after it happened. Often times he was drunk when it happened. I was abused several times, over the course of several years. I hated my dad for what he did, but I could never go as far as to blame him for doing something deliberately wrong when I knew his memory and decision-making ability were seriously compromised in the accident. To this day I don't know if he remembers doing it. At any rate, it messed me up, as you can imagine. My perfectionistic tendancies were heightened even more, as I felt I must not be "good enough" or he wouldn't be doing this to me. And I must not be "good enough" in God's eyes or He wouldn't be letting this happen to me. As usual, I didn't want to cause problems, so I kept my mouth shut. I felt sorry for him. His life had already been destroyed. In my 9-yr-old mind, I didn't need to make things any worse for him.



Time went by. We moved, and we moved - wherever Mom could find a better paying job. Finally, we moved to Florida to stay, and that ended my visitation dilemma. Distance put a stop to the visitations and the abuse. My mother remarried. I never really got close to my stepfather. Needless to say I was very wary of men, and at 13 I was just beginning to understand my own sexuality and felt very uncomfortable around him. Life had taught me that men A) left you, and B)abused you. I kept my distance. By high school, I was pretty emotionally "on my own" . My mother and I were never close. I never let myself get close to her. She was no teddy bear herself, so she never really pursued a close relationship with me. I think I believed, in my warped mind, that she should have protected me from my father. Never mind that I had never told her what was going on.


It was in high school that God became the potter and I the clueless clay, though it would be years before I realized it. I had always attended church (I was even youth group president or vice, I can't remember which), therefore I knew who God was and I believed that Jesus had died for my sins, but it was all an intellectual understanding. I talked the talk and walked the walk out of fear of disappointing yet another figure in my life: God.



I truly believe that the 18 inches from your head to your heart are the longest 18 inches in the world. It can be so hard for the heart to accept what the mind already knows to be true. Our human nature is to take control of a bad situation in a futile attempt to make it alright again. That is exactly what I did. And God loved me exactly enough in my pitiful humanity to keep me from complete self-destruction while still allowing me to learn the hard way - my way - that my being in control was a really bad idea.



I became extremely depressed in high school. Like a lot of teenagers, I hated being with my parents and I felt life was a drag. Unlike many teenagers, I really hated myself. I couldn't measure up to my own expectations. In my mind, my father would have left me alone and my mother would have fought for me and shown more affection if I was worth the effort. I thought I had to be everything to everyone (which, by the way, is impossible) or risk being rejected and worthless. I had tried and failed to control my own fate. It all finally caught up to me my sophomore year. I stopped eating, for the most part. I ate in front of others when necessary, but other than that, I punished myself by swearing off food. I became self-mutilating. It felt so good to hurt myself. For those few minutes I could numb the emotional pain inside of me. In fact, it felt so good that even today, when I am under an extreme amount of stress, I am tempted to hurt myself again. I also started having panic attacks. Some were legit, and some were forced, both for attention and to experience that "high" feeling right before passing out. Once again, I was trying to escape my pain.



Ultimately, none of those actions got me what I wanted: Permanently rid of the pain. So I attempted suicide. Several times. They were feeble attempts, really, but the desire to die was definitely there. The only reason I didn't try something completely fatal is the God-directed concern of my high school Peer Counseling teacher. You see, as soon as the school administration got wind of my suicidal tendancies, they notified my mother (who was extremely embarrassed and angry with me). They also sentenced me to time in Peer Counseling. In peer counseling, the teacher pairs you with trained students who can relate to your situation in hopes that the peer relationship will help pull you through your crisis. I still don't know the initial reason Bonnie, the peer counseling teacher, started meeting with me instead of assigning me a peer counselor. All I know is that it was a God thing that she did. I so desperately wanted somebody to make my life okay again. I hoped Bonnie was my "somebody". What I really needed was God to be my "somebody", but it would be awhile before I realized that. Bonnie and I had a several conversations, one of the earliest being the one when she told me that people who commit suicide go to hell. Not knowing the Bible well, I believed her. I now know that this is not true, and being a born-again believer herself, Bonnie never thought it was, either. She knew I wanted desperately to please God, and she was simply willing to tell me anything she thought would keep me alive another day. It worked. God used a lie to keep me alive until he could get all the right people in the right places at the right times to pull me out of my pit. It has been 23 years, and Bonnie has since become a second mother and an excellent friend to me. We still keep in close touch.



Bonnie referred me to a therapist, and my mother thought this was a brilliant idea. I did not, but I went , grudgingly. She was yet another Bonnie, so I'll refer to her as Bonnie 2. Bonnie 2 was my counselor for several years. Although she encouraged me to work through my feelings about the abuse and the bitterness I had toward my mother.



God was also working through my youth leaders at church. God knew exactly what I needed when he put Ray and Carol in my life. Ray was the first man I ever really looked up to. He loved Christ like no one I had ever seen. He actually got giddy when he talked about Him. There was a countenance about him that I had never experienced in any other man, and somehow I knew it was the Lord in his life. It was as if we claimed to worship the same God, but in reality he was worshipping a far different, far more exciting God than I. I wanted his God. Ray was also the most gentle man I had ever met. He treated me as his own - I knew he really cared about me. He was the real deal - the Christian man I never knew existed. His wife, Carol, was the person who led me to Christ. She was completely devoted to Ray, and although I saw them squabble a few times, I knew their marriage was never in jeopardy. This was a committed couple with the Lord at the center of their marriage, and I was impressed.



My acceptance of Christ was a turning point in the security of my salvation, however, it was not a turning point in my depression and way of life. Things actually got worse for me after I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior. Don't think Satan will leave you alone once you've accepted Christ. On the contrary, things can get worse. A saved Christian is automatically an enemy of Satan, and he will find your weak spots, attack, and show no mercy.



My weak spots were fear of abandonment, fear of rejection, and my perfectionism. I knew I was going to heaven, but somehow I felt that no matter how hard I tried to please God, I was a failure to him and to everyone around me. For some reason, I was unlovable. I now know that I was unlovable at birth. Everyone is. And there is simply nothing you can do on your own to be a non-failure in God's eyes. God is a perfect being and therefore can only be in the presence of perfection. Seeing as how we are human, we are not perfect, and are therefore found unacceptable in God's eyes. Until we learn that there is nothing we can do to make God love us more, and there is nothing we can do to make God love us less, we remain forever isolated from the love He simply wants to give us - no strings attached. We'll get to more of that later. I have much running from God to do first.



My suicidal behavior didn't change much. I still hated myself. Finally, Bonnie2 suggested that my parents check me into an adolescent psychiatric hospital. I was all for it. By this time I was such a serious danger to myself that I was willing to try anything. Mostly, I just wanted to run away from the world I was living in, and the hospital was as good a place as any.




At the hospital, I was immediately placed on suicide watch. This is what they call it when the hospital won't let you out of sight of a staff person. Even at night, when you are sleeping, someone is sitting in your doorway, just waiting for you to try something dangerous so they can stop you. After a week or so they left me alone at night, but they gave me a roomate just in case. During the day I was required to attend 3 therapy sessions with 2 different therapists, sit in group therapy twice a day, drink Ensure milkshakes to force weight gain, and take Lithium for the bi-polar diagnosis I received. During down time, I had to remain in the common room, where I learned to play lots of card games and watched every episode of Quincy ever broadcast. I had to jump several hoops to get released, not the least of which was passing an exit evaluation with a psychiatrist. I quicky learned to say what they wanted to hear and manipulate the system, and I was discharged after 6 weeks, which is a relatively brief stay as far as stays in psych hospitals go.





I continued to fight the anorexia, suicidal thoughts, and self mutilation well into junior college. When I was 19, I met LuAnn. LuAnn was one of the few people who made me feel as if I was okay just being me. She wasn't my mother telling me what to do. She wasn't my therapist telling me what I needed to become. She was my friend. And she was also trouble.





LuAnn's background was similar to mine, and she felt as accepted by me as I did by her. We agreed that men were not to be trusted. Neither of us had felt particularly loved by our mothers. In our own, convoluted way, we were looking for female acceptance. The situation we found ourselves in was the perfect breeding ground for trouble. As happens in many such relationships, LuAnn and I became more than just friends. We met each other's needs in every way. She and I were involved in a sexual relationship for 3 years. In retrospect, I have to say that this is the furthest away I have ever been from God. LuAnn was filling a need for me that only God could fill. Am I a homosexual? No. Was I sexually attracted to her? No, but I was so afraid of losing her love that I was willing to do anything she wanted me to do to keep it. This was the closest thing to love that I had ever experienced, and I wasn't about to give it up.





LuAnn and I parted ways almost 3 years to the day that our relationship officially began. She had found someone else. She had been my first love, and I was devestated. Soon after we broke up, I went off to college. My first year was horrible. I had a very hard time adjusting to such a big change. In spite of my twisted thinking and ungodly actions, I still had a desire to be what God wanted me to be, but I didn't know how. Once again, enter God.





I ran across a flyer advertising a Campus Bible Fellowship. I decided to try it out. In Campus Bible Fellowship I met Bev. Bev was an Independent Baptist Missionary to the University of South Florida campus and a biblical counselor. She immediately sensed a need in me and took me under her wing. Bev knew scripture better than anyone I had ever met. She would counsel me several days a week, and was forever pointing me toward God. She did not allow me to put her on a pedestal, hard as I tried. I started healing, and she was forever reminding me that it was God doing the healing, not her. She gave me homework each time we met, and it was always Bible memorization or applying Biblical principals to my own life. I began to realize that the Bible had the answers I was looking for.




One night, during a very rocky moment in my emotional stablilty, Bev helped me to see that I needed to quit trying to make myself "good enough". I needed to let God make me "good enough" by loving me. Nothing I could do could ever make God love me more, and nothing I could do could ever make God love me less. And it was all about Him loving me, not me loving Him.



Bev asked me a seemingly innocent question: "How do you define gift?" According to Webster, a gift is something you give someone, expecting nothing in return. Then she showed me Romans6:23 "For the wages of sin is death, but the FREE GIFT of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Then Ephesians2:8-9 "By grace you have been saved BY FAITH. And this is not your own doing; it is a GIFT of God, NOT A RESULT OF WORKS, so that no man may boast." Saved from what? Our sins. And why did God save me from my sin? Because He loved me. And 1 John 4:10: "In this is love, NOT THAT WE HAVE LOVED GOD, BUT THAT HE LOVED US and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." Then Romans 5:5-8: "While we we were still weak, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For one will scarcely die for an unrighteous person- though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die - but GOD SHOWS HIS LOVE FOR US IN THAT WHILE WE WERE STILL SINNERS, CHRIST DIED FOR US." Why did He give us such an incredible free gift when we have done nothing to deserve it? Because He loves us. And our salvation - our love from God through the sacrifice of his Son - requires nothing from us but acceptance. He wants to give you His love, but you have to accept it with your heart, not your head. Until we get our concept of God straight, we can't possibly understand what real love is. I had received God into my head, not my heart. Bev and I then prayed for me to receive Christ into my heart. From the moment I prayed and accepted God's FREE GIFT of love through the death and resurrection of Jesus, my heart began to change. God softened it up. It was risky to accept His love. All I had known of love was very conditional. But isn't that faith? And isn't faith a risky thing in general? I always equate a leap of faith with cliff jumping. You never know if there will be rocks or pillows at the bottom til you jump. I implore you, trust God that there are pillows and jump.

Since I got my concept of God's love straight, He has made it possible for me, over time, to forgive my father and my mother. I also turned over all the major "stuff" to Him. I swore off men, praying that He would provide me with the right one in His good time. And He did. We've been married 9 years and have two wonderful boys. I am no longer anorexic (in fact, I could stand to lose 50 pounds. I'm not exaggerating!). I no longer desire to die. I want to live, and share God's message of love with others so they can see how much He loves us, and how He is with us all along the way, even when we are running from Him.

So, would I change any of it if I could go back and do it all again? Absolutely not. It's not about me. It's about God's plan, and a bigger picture I can't see. He will use all of this to His glory if only I'll let Him. And His glory is all that matters. My prayer is that in reading this you will be drawn closer to Him, and that the awesomeness of His love will humble you and touch your heart like it has mine.