Experience Required

 

It doesn't matter where you live on this planet or how you were raised or how much money you have. Troubles are everywhere and no human can escape them. I have never been a fan of comparing our troubles. When my husband was very sick and going through chemo, I will never forget finding out that one of my friends was dealing with her husband's job loss and she had hidden this from me. I asked her why she didn't tell me and she said, "I felt embarrassed because what you are going through is so much worse".

This made me so very sad. I grabbed her and hugged her and said, "Chica, no need to compare because what your family is enduring is so stressful and hard and I'm here for you just like you've been here for me." She and I agreed in that moment that we would pray for each other. We didn't know how things would be resolved, but ultimately, my husband got better and her husband got an even higher level position. 

Over the years, I have seen troubles that are even worse than stage four cancer. I have suffered through some circumstances that have nearly killed me.  I am currently in a whirlwind of troubles that have me physically almost unable to get out of bed. Yet, God gives me the strength I need in the moment I need it to get up and to do what I must do. He is a faithful God who truly never leaves us or forsakes us. He is true to His word and He keeps all His promises.

It does not always feel that way. Sometimes it feels like Our Father in Heaven is cruel and unloving. It feels like He has left the building and we are on our own being fed to the wolves. Our eyes just can't see what His can see. We might not like this truth, but the way we grow and learn is through the piles of troubles and experiences that are not necessarily pleasant.

And one of the hardest truths is that we can't truly learn from other people's experiences. We have to learn from our own. Oh, we can be blessed by the wisdom of others when they share their lessons learned from experience. We can take notes and apply some of their lessons to our own lives, especially if we are experiencing something similar to what they endured. I have personally shared many great tips and advice to young caregivers of cancer patients over the years and they certainly appreciate my wisdom, but they still have to get through the wretched illness on their own and learn their own lessons along the way.

Today I am in deep distress because of several experiences I am being forced to endure at once. It is really tough, but I am choosing to remember that at the end of all of this, I will have learned a really great lesson and it will be worth the pain. Just when you think you have learned all the lessons you have to learn, you are reminded that until you take your final breath, you have much to learn. How exhausting! But also, thank you Lord for always being with us through the tough times even if we cannot feel Your presence.

Off I go to learn. Pray for me to stay strong.

Hope

 

Broken. Her heart was crushed to powder and I can't do anything about it. I have seen her endure things no one should ever have to endure. So, when she moved during a pandemic and was able to make lots of friends and even begin dating someone she ultimately fell in love with, I was so impressed by her.

My daughter suffered a horrible tragedy when she was a teenager. It took a long time for her to rise, but she did. Her scars are big, but God's love is bigger. He never left her and He never forsook her. He always keeps His promises.

When she was falling in love, I could see it in her. It was hard for her to trust, but she gave in to love and let this man penetrate her heart and soul. She even told him about the trauma that happened in high school and he told her how sorry he was that she had to experience that. And he promised her to be her man forever.

He asked her dad and me for her hand. Her dad gave his blessing as long as he would promise to love God more than anyone else followed by our daughter. He promised. We all believed him.

What we did not know was that a month ago, he did something he should never have done. It caused a whirlwind of damage for my daughter and for her circle of friends. They all turned against Morgan because they don't know what really happened. Morgan chose forgiveness and love. We kept planning a wedding.

Then, three weeks before their day, he caved. He could no longer handle the pressure of what his family was doing. I am being very careful because I won't expose them for what they really are, but I will say that his dad should have given him counsel to get real help. Instead, he advised him to cover up what he did and never tell anyone. He harmed my daughter and no one knows the truth. All of the participants in this ambush are getting away with it and delighting in the damage they caused.

Her heart is so broken and to make it all worse, a couple of months ago, she discovered an enlarged lymph node on her neck and it has not decreased in size with antibiotics. So, on July 8 she gets to head to a cancer center to do more tests to determine if it's malignant.

Blindsided and dumped only three weeks til her wedding to the man she loves and a cancer scare. All of this on a 24-year-old who has already experienced a trauma so severe it nearly killed her. I am more than just angry. I want to expose them all and I want them all to hurt, but as a Christian, I am told to forgive. Therefore, I will walk in forgiveness. That family should be paying me at least part of the costs of the wedding they sabotaged. They should be writing me a check for $40,000 and telling Morgan they are sorry for what they did. They know what they did, but they are lying. I know what they did too and unbeknownst to them, I have evidence. I also am armed with the truth about their son.

We never saw justice for what happened to her as a teenager. People with deep pockets and important connections made sure that didn't happen. We likely will see no justice for this one either. It is completely unfair and our daughter and entire family has been assaulted.

Hope. I don't see any hope, but on June 25, Morgan adopted a sweet puppy and named her Hope. We all love her already. May HOPE bring healing.

Look Up

 

This week has been an intense reminder that this world is dark and evil and coming to a brutal end soon. Sunday, a beautiful young woman I loved died. Jaimee had a big impact on my life. Often you hear people say that someone is beautiful on the inside and outside and it's a cute thing to say, but in her case, this is absolutely the truth. Physically, she was gorgeous with long blonde hair and a perfectly sculpted body. Spiritually, she loved Jesus more than anything else and she lived a honeymoon marriage to her husband and she loved her son Oliver beyond words.

I have been devastated about her loss. When she was 18 and I was 22 we met and I loved her like she was a little sister. When we knew we were about to part ways for a long time (she would be traveling around the world and I would be staying in Mexico), we decided to pretend give each other our pinky fingers so we would be forced to mail them back to each other and stay in touch. It was just a silly joke that no one else would understand and we didn't care. We understood and had a strong bond of love and respect for each other.

Jaimee went on to do amazing things in her life. She became a champion ballroom dancer and an actress, starring in two movies. She got married and truly adored her husband, always doting on him like they had just met and still had those puppy love feelings for each other. She struggled to have a baby for many years and when she finally was able to get pregnant and give birth to her son Oliver, she was over the moon in love with him. Her sudden death Sunday stings to my core. I know she is dancing with Jesus now, but I just feel like the lights went out in Nashville where she lived. 

August has been filled with loss. We lost our friend Brad just weeks ago. Friends, family and acquaintances are getting very sick with COVID again. Afghanistan has been a horrible mess with soldiers and citizens being wiped out in bombings. Hurricane Ida will make landfall tomorrow evening in Louisiana and is expected to mark the anniversary of Katrina by being as deadly. Wildfires once again consume our lands in California and Minnesota and beyond.

It would be so easy to cower under the pressure and pain and crawl into a ball in my closet and just cry in the darkness. Actually I did that earlier this week. But that was just my grief and need to let out the sorrow a bit. Today, although I am exhausted and would like to just quit, I will do what I was instructed to do in these days. I will look up. 

And to copy the final words of the Holy Bible: "The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen."

War Wounds

Wilson Joseph Pruiett
September 3, 1925-September 28, 2005

This week, I've had two very vivid dreams about my grandaddy, Wilson Joseph Pruiett. Grandaddy was a World War II hero. He joined the Navy and served on the Wasp from November-December 1943. Then he was transferred to the USS Santee. He was in the invasions of Palau, New Guinea, Morotai, Guam and the Philippines.

On October 25, 1944, during the Battle of the Leyte Gulf, the Japanese deployed kamikaze (“divine wind”) suicide bombers against American warships for the first time. Grandaddy was struck when the plane hit the hangar deck.

A piece of shrapnel (pictured below) took out his right eye and eyelid and cut through his nose. He also got a slug in his chest, three slugs below his left knee, and one pound piece of shrapnel in his right leg.

He was in many hospitals and endured many surgeries. His cast went from his toes to his armpits. On May 26, 1946, he received honorable discharge from the Navy. He received many medals and ribbons including the purple heart.

This morning, thanks to these dreams I've had, I've been thinking about how brave Grandaddy was. Also, it occurred to me that he never complained. He never felt self-pity. And my husband Bill and I were talking just two days ago about the fact that Grandaddy always made us laugh. He was so funny and had no filter at all. And he didn't give a crap what anyone thought because he was who he was.

The greatest thing about him was his love for God and his family. That love endures long past his death. It runs profoundly through us all. He didn't need his eye to be able to see God's truth. That was something he lived each day.

In my own life in recent years, I've often felt like I've been at war. Our family has been struck by extremely difficult life circumstances that have left us feeling deeply wounded. My "kamikaze" has left me feeling like I have a mental/emotional limp and missing eye, but I would like to be like Grandaddy. I'd like to get up and move forward and live a victorious and abundant life anyway.

Thank you, Grandaddy, for your example of strength in the midst of pain. Thank you for your faithfulness and genuine spirit. I look forward to seeing you in our Heavenly Home again where you are surely running along the streets of gold with two beautiful eyes and a heart filled with peace, love, and joy. XOXOXOXO

The shrapnel from the kamikaze
that struck my grandaddy

Delayed Gratification

Today I've been thinking about patience. Truthfully, I have been thinking about it a lot for years. To be a good teacher (especially a middle school teacher), you have to have more patience than the average person. You have to have the ability to get extremely calm and under control in the most heated of moments.

This is not a skill (yes, I consider it a learned skill) that comes easy. It's one you have to work on constantly. If patience were something we were all naturally gifted with, I don't think there would be so many passages in the Bible that tell us to "wait on God".

In my years working with kids, I have noticed that a majority of them struggle with waiting. And the hardest part about waiting is when you've been promised something you really want. All you can think about is getting it. This Ted Talk is only five minutes long and it really speaks volumes about human nature. It's not about where you come from on planet Earth. All humans struggle to wait. Check out the talk "Don't Eat the Marshmallow" here.

Personally, I feel like God has made me a promise. In fact, on April 8, 2014, I felt like He clearly spoke something very specific to me. Instead of receiving this promise, I am still sitting here on October 22, 2017 having received the opposite of this promise. Instead of the beautiful gift, I have lived in constant agony. My zeal and passion for life have been destroyed. Everything I love was touched and negatively affected. It has left me heartbroken. And like the Scripture says, "a broken heart dries the bones".

I don't know what the hold up is, but the pain and adversity have taught me a lot about patience. Patience as defined by the dictionary means "the bearing of provocation, annoyance, misfortune, or pain, without complaint, loss of temper, irritation, or the like; an ability or willingness to suppress restlessness or annoyance when confronted with delay; quiet, steady perseverance; even-tempered care; diligence".

According to the above, I have not remained totally patient in these long, heavy years. As a middle school teacher, I have known all along that patience is a learned skill, not a natural quality. The hard lesson has been to see that it is a learned skill in all aspects of our life. It's hard to say this, but ultimately, I am grateful for God's promises not being quickly and easily handed to me. I am glad He sees fit to strengthen me through fiery trials. I'm thankful for the harsh pain because when His promise is fulfilled, it will mean so much more to me.

I have learned much about delayed gratification. When I receive that marshmallow, it will be all the sweeter because I had to wait. I don't know how much longer I will have to wait, but I wait and I choose to believe. And through the pain, I will continue to obey and practice self control. That means taking a breath when I am punched and forcing myself to calm down. That means enduring sometimes excruciating pain without letting the pain move me. It means working hard no matter how many beatings I am forced to take. Staying quiet and at peace deep inside while I wait.

Some day, I will see the promise fulfilled. I have no idea how it will happen. But I know it will happen because my Father in Heaven owns the cattle on a thousand hills and with Him, all things are possible. Teach me Lord to wait.

Jesus Loves Me

In February of last year, right at the beginning of a very traumatic experience that has left me in constant pain, I felt like the Lord told me to take a day off from asking Him for anything or praying for anyone at all. I believed He told me to just spend an entire day loving Him. In my prayers, I only thanked Him and loved Him without bringing any of my pain or concerns to Him about myself or anyone else. I wrote a blog post about that (you can read it here). On that day, I felt incredible peace and I believed that this was God's way of helping me enter into a tough battle, strengthening me for what might be a very challenging time.

But as time went on, and the battles were many and very painful, I kept wondering where God was. Why did He make me spend an entire day loving on Him, while He hasn't loved on me? It's been well over a year and instead of reaching down to me and making me feel His love, He has allowed me to be destroyed! He has allowed me to go down into a dark pit where I've been beaten and mocked. Why would God be so cruel? Why would He tell me to love on Him without even once during any of this allow me to feel even a tiny glimpse of His love for me?

I never complained about any of this, but I did wonder. But today on my walk with my dog, I got my answer. Jesus is with me wherever I go. He doesn't want my heart only in the good times, but in the bad too. He wants me to believe in His presence whether I feel it or not. So, He's been silent, but He's been with me. And He has loved me more than I will ever understand. He has not been up there watching me suffer with a smile on His face. He's been holding me in His arms while I cry. He's been wiping my tears and feeling compassion for me through it all. And He taught me way back in February of last year to love Him so that I could remember that feeling of peace when I was in the dark pit. You see, the greatest lesson I learned that day I just loved on the Lord was that I feel PEACE when I concentrate on loving Him. No matter where I am or what is happening, when I put my focus and energy on loving God, my pain decreases. I'm still in the pit, but I feel peace!

He reminded me of that peace on my morning walk. He reminded me that He didn't ask me to love on Him that day for Him, but for me. It was so that I could look to Jesus Christ in my most desperate moments and find peace. He will handle all the bad stuff for me. He will fight for me. He will ultimately destroy those tormenters of my soul. I just need to look to Him and find peace. God doesn't need my love. I am the one who needs His. And because He loves me, I love Him. He desires my love and wants it to come from my heart, not lip service because I need something from Him. Well, He has my heart and always will. I love Jesus because Jesus loves me.

Beauty for Ashes

It was March 2014 when my life would forever change. Because of certain legal battles and for the need to protect some people I love, I cannot write about specifics. But here I am more than three years later and instead of seeing justice, instead of seeing God avenge us, the battles have continued. They have been fierce and have left me bleeding on the ground with barely a breath left in me.

Does this sound dramatic? That is only because I have lived through some things I could have never imagined anyone enduring. I have actually laughed about it a few times and said, "my life is a telenovela!" But it's not funny. It's devastating. But, if you continue reading, you will see why I haven't given up and why this blog post isn't a pity party, but a story of hope.

I always believed that God would give beauty for ashes (Isaiah 61:3), yet I am laying here in smoke and ashes, choking on my pain and exhaustion. I know loss. I know pain. I know destruction. I am intimately acquainted with grief and sorrow. Those outside of this who have witnessed my suffering don't know what to say or what to do. They love me and hate seeing me suffer, but they can't fix it. No one other than my husband knows the extent of this trouble. He has endured most of it right alongside me. I have been in awe as the past few months, he has picked himself up and strengthened his mind, body and spirit. I am in the process of doing this too, but I get knocked down every time I attempt to stand.

Today I have been thinking about the book in the Bible that really tests our hearts- Job. This guy was living a good and decent life and then everything was taken from him. He had no idea why! Sadly, his "friends" tried to figure it all out. They tried to speak for God and tell Job that surely he must have done something wrong to be in this state. The devastation was too intense and there was no way that God would bring such destruction to anyone unless that person deserved it. There was Job, suffering like no one around him could comprehend, and instead of holding him and crying with him, his so-called friends preached. You know what? There is a time to speak and there is a time to shut up.

There will be many lessons I take away from my own suffering. This will end some day and I will look back and thank the Lord God for loving me enough to allow all of this. When that day comes, I would like to remember what it feels like to be in this smoke and ash. I would like to look at others who are suffering and hold them. It may be that they need to hear: "this isn't happening because you did something wrong, but because God is preparing you for something big".

Today I needed that reminder, so I listened to a sermon from Dr. Charles Stanley about God's timing. He mentioned a boy named David. This young man was anointed to be the next king of Israel, but 14 years went by in which he was in danger, fleeing and hiding for fear of his life.  According to Dr. Stanley, "God had a plan. It was a perfect plan. He executed His plan, but not on someone else’s schedule. His timing was perfect. God has a plan for YOUR life and that doesn’t mean that what’s in that plan is yours today. It is yours when God gets you ready. And what was God doing to David in all those years? Getting him ready. Teaching him how to suffer. Teaching him how to forgive. Teaching him to be wise. Teaching him to be loving. Teaching him to be respectful of the king who tried to kill him. Twice he could have killed Saul, but he didn’t do it. That wasn’t God’s timing."

Does God have a plan for your life? Yes. Will it look like my journey? No. It will, however, very likely include some pain and suffering. Everyone likes looking at the end of the story- you know, the one where the cancer patient becomes an Ironman. But the glory of the story isn't the Ironman. It's the pain of the cancer and how God gets the patient through it. True glory comes from God helping us get through darkness. The LIGHT has come and we get to look toward that Light while we grab the sword and fight through the darkness.

I know I'm not perfect, but I also know that my current situation is not due to some anger or judgment from God. He has a plan for my life and He's bringing me to my "promised land" in His own timing and His own way. That way happens to be very painful. If you hear me cry or scream, don't judge me. Don't be like Job's friends. Just let me cry. Let me scream. It's part of my journey. It doesn't mean I don't love God or that I don't trust Him. In fact, Jesus Christ Himself both cried and screamed. He even screamed out "My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?" Then He died and went to Hell before He rose from the grave.

I will rise from the smoke and ashes too. I will have beauty for ashes.