From: Jerald Letien
To: rkennedy@socool.com
Subject: God

My name is Connie. I am a woman of 30, a mother of two little girls and a wife of 10 years. I say this to make a point, that life does sometime turn on a dime. I know that without God I wouldn't have made it this far. This may run a little long but I feel that there many who will be able to relate to what I'm going to say.

As a child, I never lived in what would have been considered a normal family. My mother had waited to get married before having sex but my father had not. Truth is he was married to someone else when he married her. She had ne idea but it was still true. He left her before I was born to go back to his other family. So I've never met him. I was passed around to differant family for the first 5 years of my life. Then at age 5 my mother married a man and a year or 2 later my brother was born.

I still don't quite know why but when I was about 8, my step-father started to do things with me. I had already been saved and had a very close walk with God. Still I wasn't ready for this. It kept up untill finally it was full fledged incest. I didn't know what to do, after all he wouldn't do this unless there was something wrong with me. I had to be a terrible person to make such passions come to life in any one.

Now I know better but it was a long and hard battle to get here. I know that God had carry me this far because the battle had long since worn me out. For so long I was sure that God didn't want anyting to do with me because I was such a horrible sinner. I hated myself so I naturally assumed that He felt the same. This went on for years. I had a long distance love for God but felt heslpless to cahnge things because I felt like such a terrible person that God couldn't even be around me because He cann't be around sin. Through the years I allowed many stupid things to happen to me for 2 basic reasons.

One, I didn't think that I had the right to say no.

Two being that I thought there was no hope for me so why not.

Even then, God protected from my own stupidity. His grace for me has been astounding. He kept me grounded so that I only got into the little things, that are not without their risk, but they are minimal. He kept many people in my life that helped me to carry on even when I wanted to die. I could never hurt them and leave them thinknig that they did this to me. Do you see the grace of God at work here? Life was painful but He carried it with me.

Let's skip on a few years, I met my husband. He's been married 2 times before me and had some trouble with trust because of it. But we forged a relationship that has weathered many storms. In 1986 I became pregnant with my first daughter. The pregancy went well untill the day of birth. The doctor didn't clean her mouth out right and she was in a childrens hospital for 3 and half weeks. Two of those weeks were intensive care on the edge of death. I prayed from fear of losing her and my faith was not very strong bsecause I kind of felt that I would have deserved it if she would have died. Remember that I felt tht I was pure sin. But God saved her life and better than He completely healed her so that she has no camplications from it.

I have also been healed from epilepsy in the last 3 years after having it all of my life. At the time that I was healed, I was on 400 mlgs. of phenobarbitol a day. I haven't taken it in 3 years and have had no seizure problems. I didn't have withdrawal problems either. I know that this has been long winded but life is one long experience and I know that I am not alone in the things that have happened to me and my family. I wish that I were, so others wouldn't have to go through these things but I am not.

My point is this, what God has done for me, He is more than willing to do for others. All He needs is a chance to. He has brought me from the depths of dispair to a new and fresh walk with Him and I can forgive those who have hurt me in the past because I no longer need to to hold myself up with it. I hope that God blesses you with reading as much He has me with sharing it with you. By the, my brother was healed from water on the brain at only a few months old.

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