My Story - 8
I shared this post in the “Updates” section of this website a while back, but want to move it to the “Shadows” section, so here it is.
In regards to the Christian themes on this blog, I would like to tell the story of how I came to faith.
Growing up in South Redondo was magical. A perfect mix of beautiful surroundings, loving families and fun activities. My family consisted of my mom, my dad, my brother and me. Like many people have experienced, the idyllic surroundings didn’t make our family life idyllic. We had many serious illnesses in the house and also some angst coming from these trials. I did not grow up going to church, but was always drawn to Christianity and also other belief systems. I was born with a philosophical bent. Among the myriad of illnesses, my mom got breast cancer when I was in 5th grade. After she finished her surgery and treatments, other illnesses crept in for her and for my dad. During this time my brother and I also lost most of our grandparents, many aunts and uncles and even two cousins to various illnesses and tragedies. I don’t write this for pity or to insinuate I had the hardest life ever. I’m just saying it to lay the foundation to tell you how sad and lost I felt from 5th grade through college.
My mom was facing her own battles. She hung to life with desperation. She wanted healing. We were trained in Transcedental Meditation, went to psychics, tried various healing religions and sought extreme homeopathic healings. When I was 16 and my mom was 52, her cancer returned and was metastatic. Our neighbor invited her to church. She got very involved for a year and the change I saw in her ministered to me greatly. I remember her telling me that God could heal her body, but if He didn’t, she was at peace because her soul had been healed. The change in her was amazing. I already thought she was absolutely wonderful (she was my everything), but she made amends with anyone she needed to ask forgiveness from. She had new life from her belief in Jesus. She had a Savior and didn’t need to save herself.
On my 17th birthday, my mom went into the hospital for the last time. This hospital was a few blocks from Redondo High, so every day after school I walked over to the hospital and spent a few hours with her until my dad would arrive after he finished work. She asked me to read the Book of Matthew to her. Wow! We were awestruck by what is was saying, both of us truly believing what I was reading. I vividly remember talking about the portion that says that hating someone in your heart is the sin of murder. We were like, uh oh.
My current pastor was a substitute teacher and coach at Redondo. Each day he invited pretty much the whole school to a Bible Study starting Monday, June 6. We thought, ok, ok… we heard you. Early in the morning, on Monday, June 6, my mom went to be with her Savior. It was a relief to see her leave her body of pain. But I was broken. Half of me was gone. As I thought at the time, my god was dead. It was at this moment that God drew me to Him… a God that will never die, that is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. My journey of grief was long and difficult, but believing that my Heavenly Father, My Shepherd was with me in the shadow of death comforted me then as it does now.
I have been a Christian since this time. Enjoying reading about all beliefs and philosophies as well as loving the diverse writings of Sartre, Descartes, Rand, Augustine and others, you can imagine that I am tempted to stray. In my thinking though, my faith is real and indescribable. The Word of God is the only thing I hold to as absolute truth. (Obviously, I am trying to write this in a nutshell, which is impossible!). I love that the Christian faith is about God saving us and not by us saving ourselves through working hard to be good enough.
I’m really going out on a limb (for me) writing all this. I’m often quiet about my beliefs, yet today I thought I would like to share my story. I made it as brief as I could! There’s so much more to say about the faithfulness of God in my life.
Lately I’ve been writing things down as I think of them. I’ll close with something I wrote last month.
What I hope for all my loved ones: That they would know Jesus as their Savior, as the one who brings peace to their souls. Before I knew my savior, I was lost, and then I was found. I was alone, and then I was comforted. True, I have spent a lot of life contemplating the reason for existence and it’s seeming meaninglessness, but that is not to say that I do not trust God in His infinite wisdom. Trusting in his omniscient wisdom brings a peace that our own ponderings cannot and never will bring, because, as I have always said to my kids, our finite brains would explode if we understood everything about an omniscient God.
With love, Julie