While sitting here typing away one day on one of the stories from my late teens, I found myself thinking just how many years had gone by. I am now old enough to say: “That was a lifetime ago!” And for just a moment, a few milestone memories flashed across the screen of an imaginary TV in my mind.
Here is one of them.
The trip my son and I made from our home in the northeast, down south to where my brother lived took us about 3 days. We probably could have made it sooner if it hadn’t been for a few extenuating circumstances. The biggest being the inclement weather conditions.
Finally, though, we had arrived at my brother’s house. I remember it being early evening maybe around 7:30 or so on a Saturday. I was exhausted and excited at the same time. I met my new sister-in-law and her son, got reacquainted with my two nieces. It was a bit different for my son. The last time I believe he saw his uncle and cousins was roughly 5 or 6 years earlier at a family function. While we were a large family, we didn’t all get together due to the distances we lived from each other. When we were together that one time years earlier, it very well might have been the first time my son even met them.
After a couple of hours, it was plain that I was fading fast. My sister-in-law brought me to the room my son and I would share, and my brother, son, and nieces brought in only the luggage that had our change of clothing in. We could sort the rest out the next day. Just before turning in, my brother asked if I would like to go to church with him and his family. As I was politely declining for this week only, my son was accepting the invitation with excitement. My brother told me that it probably was a good idea for me to stay behind and catch up on some sleep. He added that he had no problem taking my son with him. He turned and told my son what time they would be leaving in the morning and then we said our goodnights.
As I was laying awake wondering why I could not fall asleep I started remembering some of the conversations I had with friends, during the month before I left home. I remember there was one friend in particular who could not understand why I would uproot my son and just leave. I had explained to him that I needed to find a place that would not constantly remind me of all the heartaches and bitterness that had built up inside of me. I also told him that I had built up a barrier around my heart so no one could ever get to it and hurt it again. The barrier was so solid that it was just about suffocating me. I told him these exact words: “I need to go back to being vulnerable again. I have to find a way to remember the mistakes, and the bad choices, but not close myself off from life and love. I have to learn how to trust again.”
I must have fallen asleep shortly after that. The following morning, I felt a little guilty for not having joined my family going to church. I mean that was exactly where I needed to go to learn how to love and trust again wasn’t it? When everyone came home a few hours later, I had figured out that I did need the quiet solitude to adjust myself to the fact that this was a permanent move and this was not a vacation. With a little jolt at that last thought, I realized that even though I knew this was permanent, I did kind of feel like this was a vacation when I arrived the night before.
I was surprised to see my son so excited about church. His father’s brother is a minister back home, my son had gone to his church, I knew he liked it, but I had never seen this type of excitement before. When he started to tell me about the “youth” pastor, I realized this church was much bigger than his uncle’s church back home.
By the time the following week came around, I had my son enrolled in his new school and had found a couple of part-time positions to get me going in the workforce. When Sunday rolled around, I was ready to go to church.
I want to take a moment here and recount a few feelings I had when my son and I were traveling. I kept asking myself, what in the world was I doing? I kept questioning myself if I was making a huge mistake. I kept running these questions and also others like; what if I hated this move we made, what if I made the same mistakes. What would I do then?
When we arrived at the church, I was surprised to see as many cars as I did. The church did not look that big from the outside. As we approached the building I could see the name of the church and that startled me. It was the exact word that I had inscribed on a Bible that was given to me over 20 years earlier! It is an Aramaic word, that simply meant “The Lord is coming”. As I stepped into the lobby of the church, I felt every hair on my arms stand up. Something was happening here and I had no clue, but boy was I paying attention now.
Since it was about 15 minutes before the service started, my brother was taking the time to introduce me to a few of his friends. Finally, it was time and we went through the doors into the main church. My brother and his wife led me up to about 5 rows from the front. We were off to one side. My son had already parted company and was with the youth group in another part of the church. I found myself looking around and saw that the church was full. I estimated that had to be around 500 or more people.
My brother was quietly explaining to me the schedule and in which order they came in. First would be the youth pastor’s wife to recite the scripture chosen for the day. He gave me a few other events like the choir and then the senior pastor would come out for the morning message.
The youth pastor’s wife came out in just a few minutes. The buzzing of many different conversations came to a halt. She had her Bible open and was about to read when she took a deep sigh and was silent for a few seconds. From where we were sitting we could see her profile. She looked up at the congregation straight in front of her and attempted to recite the scripture again. By now I would say about 3 minutes have gone by. When she attempted a third time and could not seem to start. She said the following statement: “I believe the Lord is pressing it upon me to say” at this time she turned and looked right at me and remained with eye contact as she finished her sentence: ”that we must come to Him with vulnerability.” I sat there for about 5 seconds letting those words sink in before I started crying my eyes out. I was silent but the tears were pouring out of my eyes, running down my face and I could barely contain the sobs that I knew were about to erupt from deep down. My brother just silently took out a clean napkin from his pocket and handed it to me.
I had not told one other soul about the conversation I had with my friend back north. I had not used that description to anyone else at all. If I didn’t get it before this moment, I got now. This move was not a mistake, this opportunity to turn my life around and begin to make better decisions was not something formulated by mere chance. No, this was God. This was God answering a very short plea for help, one that I had forgotten all about. This was God taking his child in His loving arms and carrying her until she could stand up again.
I can say without a doubt that was the moment my life changed. God had my back and He had my attention.