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By Donna Lord, U.S.A.
My grandmother told me that my brother received one hundred percent of our birth mother’s attention even after my twin sister and I were born two years later. When my grandmother and aunt came to our house, we would both be crying from no diaper changes, feedings or care. However, my brother would be changed, fed and happy.
In our teens we learned the reason for the neglect—we were girls! Our birth mother was raised to believe that girls don't count, and here she had given birth to twin girls. Before we were a year old, my 17-year-old, alcoholic Mom left us all. (She and her sisters had experienced the same kind of rejection and abandonment from their birth mother.)
My 22-year-old dad was left to care for two infants and a toddler. My grandmother and aunt helped care for us until Dad remarried. When he did, I got a stepbrother (one year older), a stepsister (two months younger) and of course, a stepmother. A half-sister was born when my twin and I were three years old. Now we were a so-called blended family.
The new baby was the apple of my stepmom’s eye, along with her other two children. My brother, sister and I did not feel loved or accepted. I received the brunt of stepmom’s unjust anger and constant punishment. I was always in my room, in a corner, on restriction or getting the belt. I was always told to “stop that” without knowing what “that” was. When I was told not to throw up or wet the bed, I would be so worried about not doing either that sometimes I would do both. If I said I had a headache, Stepmom would say, "No, you don’t.” Only what she thought mattered, not the truth. But an unloving stepmom would only be part of my troubles.
At five years of age I was the target for the boy babysitters. They would practice having sex with me and my sister, and told us not to tell; it was a secret. My dad was always working and Stepmom kept him from us, so we had no one to tell. In our teen years my two brothers also practiced sex on us. My half-sister knew about it, but that was too big a matter for her to tell on us! Each destructive experience just reaffirmed what I believed: 1) I did something bad to deserve such hurtful treatment. 2) I hate being a girl. If I were male, I would not be hurt. 3) I hate myself; I hate Stepmom.
When I was in the fifth grade, I decided I needed to run away from Stepmom. However, in the attempt I found it was scarier to run away than to live with her. Black became my favorite color because it fit how I was feeling all the time. I spent the next several years figuring out how I could escape. I repeatedly thought of killing myself and my stepmom. One day I did take some pills, (even though I didn’t know what they were), but nothing happened. I was in a constant state of confusion, trying not to do or say anything that would get me in trouble. But it made no difference. I knew I would have to stay strong through the years of suffering.
My parents signed us up for Christian Release Time Education at the school. I was shocked to learn that there was a God and that He created everything! That same God had a Son named Jesus, and people were mean to Him and killed Him. I liked this Jesus who made blind people see, deaf people hear and the dead come back to life. Prior to these classes Jesus was only one of my dad's curse words. The world I lived in and the spiritual world I was learning of were miles and miles apart.
In ninth grade I began searching for the meaning of life. I read the writings of the poets Emerson, Thoreau, Khalil Gibran and several others, but I found nothing new. I also looked at the lives of my three best friends. They all had religion. Because of them I read the Book of Mormon, The New World Translation Bible and tried to get through the Catholic Bible. I went to church with each of them, and was certain religion was what was missing in my life.
A few years later, I met a family who talked about Jesus as if He lived with them in person. They had moved into the apartment next door to where I was babysitting full-time for the summer. I was emotionally immature for the task, so I was defeated most of the time in dealing with the children’s anger and hurt because the parents were always quarreling. The kids and I spent a lot of time with the family next door. It was a home where there was joy and a lot of singing about Jesus.
One night at church I was given a piece of paper with the Bible verse, “Be still and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth” (Psa. 46:10). I did not understand it, but I thought it was great, and put it in my wallet for safekeeping.
I was not satisfied with myself, so I kept searching. Finally, I had a personal revelation of my problem. I had no inner peace! That night while baby sitting I went to the neighbors. I knew they would bring out the Bible and ask me to pray. They first asked me to read a portion from chapter 17 of the Gospel of John. I read how the Father was in Jesus and Jesus was in the Father, and that we would be one as they are and that Jesus would be in us and the Father would be in Him. I read it several times with the same conclusion. A drunk must have written it, because it made no sense! I was also too proud to say I could not understand the verses when they asked, but they already knew I couldn’t.
When the father asked if I wanted to pray, I did not reply. Everyone just got into position with heads bowed and eyes closed and the father began to pray. I sat on the footstool with my eyes closed. Suddenly I felt myself being lifted up into the air. I closed my eyes even tighter and in my mind I said, “Lord, put me down.” Immediately I felt myself go down to the footstool again! I joined in to ask Jesus to forgive me and come and live inside of me by the Holy Ghost. I felt something like a cord as thick as a pencil being pulled through the top of my skull all the way to my belly! I was told that I was now born-again. Everyone there was happy and so was I! I was instructed to read my new Bible and talk to Jesus every day so I could be like Him.
The first thing I did that night when I went back to babysitting was read John 17:20-23, the verses I thought had been written by a drunk. I was shocked; I understood what Jesus said in that passage. I thought about what had happened to me, and I realized that I had inner peace! It was automatic; I did not ask for it. I did not ask for comfort either, but for the first time in my sixteen years I was experiencing comfort too!
I had gone from abandonment into adoption by the King of kings. Instead of rejection I was accepted by Jesus Christ the Savior. I was no longer doomed to hell with the fallen angels; I was bound for eternity with a risen Lord. My circumstances at home did not change, but I did! I noticed that I was not bothered or depressed or hateful, instead I was joyful! I no longer hardened my heart so I would not cry. But all I had received spiritually would be tested very quickly.
When I shared in a letter with my parents what Jesus had done for me and what He could do for our family, I was met with harsh words and a flogging with the kitchen towel from my stepmom. I was told I could go anywhere to church except the church I was attending. I became known as a Jesus freak at school, which meant I was an embarrassment to the family. My Bible was taken from me and I was told I could not bring it to school. I was not allowed to go to Bible College. I now knew what the verse in my wallet meant. I needed to be “still” at this time in my life.
After graduation from high school, I found work at a drug store. My sister and I moved into an apartment when I was nineteen. The following year I married a fellow believer and began raising a family. However, my husband went back to drinking and doing drugs. The children and I suffered greatly before the marriage ended in divorce.
During the next several years the Lord became my personal counselor. He took me back to my childhood experiences so I could mentally remake those life choices. He restored and renewed me. Satan did not win at that time, but he ensnared me again in another marriage. Three years into that marriage, when he touched my daughter improperly, we found that the stepfather had a dark secret. He wasn’t sorry for what he had done, only that he had been caught. After much grief and suffering, this marriage also ended in divorce.
God sustained me through the two failed marriages and raising my four children. Unfortunately, the children rebelled during their teen years. I prayed, “Lord, please do whatever it takes to turn my children around.” I knew it would take something drastic to change them.
My prayers were answered through a devastating experience. I was driving in my van on the city streets when I spotted two gang members writing graffiti on buildings. I honked at them to stop. A third person whom I did not see shot at my van door. The bullet went into my abdomen. Recovery took eighteen months because of complications. Because I could not pay the bills, I had to declare bankruptcy. The ordeal that I endured brought my children back into fellowship with me and the Lord. The Lord reminded me from Scripture that, though “evil was meant against me, God meant it for good” (Gen. 50:20). The Holy Spirit taught me that when circumstances make no sense, the words “all things work together for good ...” (Rom. 8:28) still mean just that!
As I read the Word of God, I take it literally and personally. I am determined that whatever Jesus did, I will one day do too. The Scriptures really do come alive with instruction, counsel, correction and hope.
Through the Scriptures I am reminded that life is not about me. My will has to be put to death in order to do His will. I read that Jesus has other names: Prince of peace, Counselor, Mighty God and Comforter. Through Him I have been comforted and have been able to comfort others in the same manner that Christ Himself comforts me.
I have many opportunities to comfort others in my work as a volunteer chaplain with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. I have served both in the Gulf Coast where hurricane Katrina devastated homes and lives and in San Diego, California in the aftermath of the devastating fires. I have seen firsthand how the Lord can take the bad of anything and anyone and make good of it all. Only Jesus can take every single life experience and use it for our good and His glory. Reader, let Jesus do the same for you today!
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