Anyone have a Testimony?? I do!!

My little girls came running to see if I was ok.  While mopping my kitchen floor, I had slipped and fallen very hard on my tailbone.  When my girls arrived I could only lay on the floor.  20 minutes later, I was gingerly able to get up.  The pain was severe. 

Two weeks later the radiating and aching pain was still disrupting my life.  Pain would wake me in the night.  I had difficulties standing up or sitting down.  I felt irritable and frustrated, and I was not fun to be around. 

One day, I was talking to the Lord.  (Quite honestly, I was whining.)  “Lord, I wish I didn’t believe how I believe sometimes.  Everyone whom I meet and tell about this gives me the Word of God.  Where is the love?  Where are the hugs, and kind words?  Where is the compassion?   I want sympathy, pity, and “love”…but no, all I get is a finger pointing back to your Word.”  (Yes, sad but true, I was complaining and feeling sorry for myself.)

That evening I was sitting on the bed with my husband.  I was not painless in any position, so I had propped myself up in a way that minimized the throbbing.  I got a phone call from my sister.  She had recently had surgery to remove a cyst the size of a tennis ball.   A follow up appointment that had included an ultra sound was not favorable.  She had new cysts and many more were developing.  Being very scared, she had spent a lot of time on the computer doing research.   “I think I have ovarian cancer,” she wailed, “no one understands!  They are always giving me Bible verses!  Where is the love???” 

At first I thought ‘Hallelujah!’  Someone to sympathize with!    But as I listened to her talk, I felt the Holy Spirit envelope me.  He started speaking to me. He was answering my questions.  I began to share with my sister…

“When people give you God’s Word and point to the Lord, they are giving you the greatest gift you could receive.  I know God’s Word works.  I have seen God restore, redeem, resurrect, and heal through those promises in His Word.  So when they give you God’s Word, when I give you God’s Word, I love you in a way that is far more beneficial than feeling sorry for you or with you.  I am giving you God’s Power to change your situation.  The compassion of God wells up in me when I give you scripture and encourage you to believe what He has said. “

As I said these things tears welled up in my eyes.  God was giving us His best.  He wasn’t giving us just a band-aid that would fall off later, but power to be victorious!!  I prayed with my sister, loved her, and reminded her of God’s Word .  When I got off the phone I moved the way I had moved for days…very carefully.  Then it dawned on me…wait!  NO PAIN!!  My dear Lord had healed me while I was speaking His healing to my sister!!! 

But that is not the end of the story.  A few weeks later, I got another phone call from my sister.  She had gone in for her next medical check-up.  The tests were done as they had been done before, but the doctors could not find anything wrong. NO cysts!!  Totally healed!  Glory to God!   As I had shared God’s Word with my sister, He healed both of us.  Nothing is impossible with Him!

re•lent•less

adj.
1. Unyielding in severity or strictness; unrelenting:
2. Steady and persistent; unremitting:

Relentless would be a great adjective to describe my God. I could write pages and pages about the goodness of God in my life and His relentless pursuit of me. No matter what decisions I have made, no matter the decisions that my parents made, no matter the decisions that others have made that affected my life, He has had good for me and has been steadfast to bring about His plans and will in my life.


My mother was a teen mom. She gave birth to me at the young age of 17 years old. Honestly, having me was probably overwhelming and hard on such a young one. I know that I would not have been ready to be a mama at 17. Only 18 months later she had my sister. Overwhelmed with life and a marriage that was falling apart she left me and my sister and my Dad. During this time I spent a lot of time with my Grandmother (my dad's mother). What a good thing! She loved God and loved to pray and taught me all about Jesus and His love for me. These little teachings would sustain me later when my mother and her mother left the state with us. For two years, my father and his mother had no idea where we were. During this time...I remember lying one night on a porch with a bunch of dogs and actually picturing myself being surrounded by a big bubble. I felt safe. I laid there and thought of the stories my Grandmother told me about Jesus and I talked to Jesus. I knew at three and four years of age He was with me. Through a series of events that ended up in court…my father won custody of me and my sister. I can see now as I look back His protection over me. When I was 5 years old, I knew that I wanted Jesus to be Lord of my life. He had seen me through a very hard time and knew that He would see me through anything else that life would throw my way. I asked my Mother (my father's new wife) to pray with me and we knelt by my bed and I gave the Lord my life and heart. It was the best decision I have ever made and it stuck!!

A thief comes to steal and kill and destroy, but I came to give life—life in all its fullness. -John 10:10


God saved us from these great dangers of death, and he will continue to save us. We have put our hope in him, and he will save us again. -2 Corinthians 1:10

One thing that has always been steadfast and faithful in my life is God. Sure, I have been through some hardships. I have watched my sister suffer with cancer, I have been homeless with all my siblings and parents, camping and then later government shelters and housing, I have seen my Dad leave my mother after 23 years of marriage for another woman and then proclaim that God told him to do it. I have also seen God’s miraculous provision and goodness, reconciliation, healing and forgiveness to my family and myself in all these examples. I can look back on my life and know that it was God that walked us through the hard times. I will say this…not once did I blame God for these things. Not once did I shake my fist and say …why God!!?? I have never been angry with God.  God is good. He did not bring these things my way. There is a god of the world and his name is satan or the devil and he wants to kill us. We live on an earth that has been ravaged by sin and satan’s ways. God is my deliverer, Savior, redeemer, friend, and is relentless in His love for me. I trust Him. He is faithful even when I am unfaithful. He is strong when I am weak. He upholds me with His goodness and love. Give your life to Him. He can be trusted.


melanie

Forgiveness - God's Way

I was thinking about my Dad the other day. I really don't want to go into it...but there was a rocky 8 years before he passed away. In the end..the Lord..reconciled us and forgiveness was given and taken. I have found that the Lord has really impressed on my heart to be very careful how I speak of him now. I understood it only in that I wanted to obey the Lord..not in the why of it, until the other day......

The other day it flooded all over me why. I was reading in Hebrews. I love Hebrews. It is probably one of my favorite books in the Bible. I love, love chapter 11. While I was thinking on my Dad...that chapter came to mind. I went and read it. It amazes me. It is talking about faith...believing God beyond what we see, taste, touch, or feel. Men and Women that got a Word from the Lord, held on and refused to let the circumstances or their failures stop what God had put in their hearts. It is also a chapter that shows what God's forgiveness is. How? Think about it. Abraham and Sarah..Noah, Samson, Moses, David, Rahab and Gideon is in this chapter. This is what the Holy Spirit says about them through Paul. (I put the whole chapter down there for reference. I absolutely love the Amplified version of it.) If you read the OT account of these people ...you will see failure in a lot of ways..yet in Hebrews God says nothing of these failures but says things like...they waited expectantly and confidently....fixed and firm...by faith they did what they did...obeyed and received an inheritance....controlled and sustained by their faith, prompted by faith. Abraham and Sarah...all good about them...steadfast and full of faith...yet you read their stories and they made some big mistakes. This is the forgiveness of the Lord...in this chapter we see how the Holy Spirit sees Abraham and Sarah. He made no mention of Hagaar or Ishmael...Sarah laughing...and so forth...NOTHING. Moses...he makes no mention of him murdering the Egyptian or the burning bush where he said he could not speak. Gideon..his lack of faith with the fleece or how scared he was. Noah..drunk and naked in his tent. Jacob..deceiving his brother for the birthright. Rahab, a prostitute,  is accounted for her faith and actually is in the lineage of Jesus Himself. David..a man after God's own heart...a murderer and adulterer. God's complete forgiveness for people is in this chapter. No shortcomings..no failures...only men and women full of faith believing on God. It is so powerful. He did not hold their sins against them, did not remember them...and these are men and women that did not have Jesus like we do now! How much more do we have!!! This is an example of true love and forgiveness. How we need to be toward people and their sins against us.

So..I go back to what the Lord has laid on my heart about my Dad. At the end of his life..he repented. I told my Dad that I held nothing against him. If I am to forgive my Dad like God forgave him...then those years are no more. My Dad walked with God..prayed in the morning...and did his best to serve the Lord. This is his legacy..this is what God remembers...this is what I remember. :)



1NOW FAITH is the assurance (the confirmation, [a]the title deed) of the things [we] hope for, being the proof of things [we] do not see and the conviction of their reality [faith perceiving as real fact what is not revealed to the senses].


2For by [faith--[b]trust and holy fervor born of faith] the men of old had divine testimony borne to them and obtained a good report.


3By faith we understand that the worlds [during the successive ages] were framed (fashioned, put in order, and equipped for their intended purpose) by the word of God, so that what we see was not made out of things which are visible.


4[Prompted, actuated] by faith Abel brought God a better and more acceptable sacrifice than Cain, because of which it was testified of him that he was righteous [that he was upright and in right standing with God], and God bore witness by accepting and acknowledging his gifts. And though he died, yet [through the incident] he is still speaking.(A)


5Because of faith Enoch was caught up and transferred to heaven, so that he did not have a glimpse of death; and he was not found, because God had translated him. For even before he was taken to heaven, he received testimony [still on record] that he had pleased and been satisfactory to God.(B)


6But without faith it is impossible to please and be satisfactory to Him. For whoever would come near to God must [necessarily] believe that God exists and that He is the rewarder of those who earnestly and diligently seek Him [out].


7[Prompted] by faith Noah, being forewarned by God concerning events of which as yet there was no visible sign, took heed and diligently and reverently constructed and prepared an ark for the deliverance of his own family. By this [his faith which relied on God] he passed judgment and sentence on the world's unbelief and became an heir and possessor of righteousness ([c]that relation of being right into which God puts the person who has faith).(C)


8[Urged on] by faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and went forth to a place which he was destined to receive as an inheritance; and he went, although he did not know or trouble his mind about where he was to go.


9[Prompted] by faith he dwelt as a temporary resident in the land which was designated in the promise [of God, though he was like a stranger] in a strange country, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, fellow heirs with him of the same promise.(D)


10For he was [waiting expectantly and confidently] looking forward to the city which has fixed and firm foundations, whose Architect and Builder is God.


11Because of faith also Sarah herself received physical power to conceive a child, even when she was long past the age for it, because she considered [God] Who had given her the promise to be reliable and trustworthy and true to His word.(E)


12So from one man, though he was physically as good as dead, there have sprung descendants whose number is as the stars of heaven and as countless as the innumerable sands on the seashore.(F)


13These people all died controlled and sustained by their faith, but not having received the tangible fulfillment of [God's] promises, only having seen it and greeted it from a great distance by faith, and all the while acknowledging and confessing that they were strangers and temporary residents and exiles upon the earth.(G)


14Now those people who talk as they did show plainly that they are in search of a fatherland (their own country).


15If they had been thinking with [homesick] remembrance of that country from which they were emigrants, they would have found constant opportunity to return to it.


16But the truth is that they were yearning for and aspiring to a better and more desirable country, that is, a heavenly [one]. For that reason God is not ashamed to be called their God [even to be surnamed their God--the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob], for He has prepared a city for them.(H)


17By faith Abraham, when he was put to the test [while the testing of his faith was [d]still in progress], [e]had already brought Isaac for an offering; he who had gladly received and welcomed [God's] promises was ready to sacrifice his only son,(I)


18Of whom it was said, Through Isaac shall your descendants be reckoned.(J)


19For he reasoned that God was able to raise [him] up even from among the dead. Indeed in the sense that Isaac was figuratively dead [potentially sacrificed], he did [actually] receive him back from the dead.


20[With eyes of] faith Isaac, looking far into the future, invoked blessings upon Jacob and Esau.(K)


21[Prompted] by faith Jacob, when he was dying, blessed each of Joseph's sons and bowed in prayer over the top of his staff.(L)


22[Actuated] by faith Joseph, when nearing the end of his life, referred to [the promise of God for] the departure of the Israelites out of Egypt and gave instructions concerning the burial of his own bones.(M)


23[Prompted] by faith Moses, after his birth, was kept concealed for three months by his parents, because they saw how comely the child was; and they were not overawed and terrified by the king's decree.(N)


24[Aroused] by faith Moses, when he had grown to maturity and [f]become great, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter,(O)


25Because he preferred to share the oppression [suffer the hardships] and bear the shame of the people of God rather than to have the fleeting enjoyment of a sinful life.


26He considered the contempt and abuse and shame [borne for] the Christ (the Messiah Who was to come) to be greater wealth than all the treasures of Egypt, for he looked forward and away to the reward (recompense).


27[Motivated] by faith he left Egypt behind him, being unawed and undismayed by the wrath of the king; for he never flinched but held staunchly to his purpose and endured steadfastly as one who gazed on Him Who is invisible.(P)


28By faith (simple trust and confidence in God) he instituted and carried out the Passover and the sprinkling of the blood [on the doorposts], so that the destroyer of the firstborn (the angel) might not touch those [of the children of Israel].(Q)


29[Urged on] by faith the people crossed the Red Sea as [though] on dry land, but when the Egyptians tried to do the same thing they were swallowed up [by the sea].(R)


30Because of faith the walls of Jericho fell down after they had been encompassed for seven days [by the Israelites].(S)


31[Prompted] by faith Rahab the prostitute was not destroyed along with those who refused to believe and obey, because she had received the spies in peace [without enmity].(T)


32And what shall I say further? For time would fail me to tell of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, of David and Samuel and the prophets,(U)


33Who by [the help of] faith subdued kingdoms, administered justice, obtained promised blessings, closed the mouths of lions,(V)


34Extinguished the power of raging fire, escaped the devourings of the sword, out of frailty and weakness won strength and became stalwart, even mighty and resistless in battle, routing alien hosts.(W)


35[Some] women received again their dead by a resurrection. Others were tortured [g]to death with clubs, refusing to accept release [offered on the terms of denying their faith], so that they might be resurrected to a better life. [I Kings 17:17-24; II Kings 4:25-37.]


36Others had to suffer the trial of mocking and scourging and even chains and imprisonment.


37They were stoned to death; they were lured with tempting offers [to renounce their faith]; they were sawn asunder; they were slaughtered by the sword; [while they were alive] they had to go about wrapped in the skins of sheep and goats, utterly destitute, oppressed, cruelly treated--


38[Men] of whom the world was not worthy--roaming over the desolate places and the mountains, and [living] in caves and caverns and holes of the earth.


39And all of these, though they won divine approval by [means of] their faith, did not receive the fulfillment of what was promised,


40Because God had us in mind and had something better and greater in view for us, so that they [these heroes and heroines of faith] should not come to perfection apart from us [before we could join them].




melanie

my testimony - pt. 2

We returned to the state I was taken. The events that took place during that time were difficult. It took many, many years for me to be able to share them without sobbing. The feelings still overwhelm me. It was so confusing. I could not understand all that was going on. At one point we were leaving the courthouse and someone gave me a bag full of gifts - crayons, coloring books, treats - and said they were from my Dad. I honestly did not remember him. I remember searching around the parking lot trying to get a glimpse of this Father.

From what I was told...the battle that ensued in the other room was ugly. Finally..after deliberation's, my mother was declared an unfit mother by the state and all her rights were stripped with a order that she was to stay away from me till 18. While this was going on I was sitting in the back coloring. Suddenly, a group of people came running into the room with tears all in their eyes, laughing, rejoicing, and my father grabbed me and hugged me. I did not know what was going on and began crying. I cried for a very long time.

By this time my Father had remarried and they had a little baby already. For some reason, the only thing that brought me comfort was that baby...K. My new mother told me that at one point she told me she was my mother. I innocently looked up and said..."I have three mothers now?" Right then she knew I had been through a lot already.

Later..we picked up my sister. She had gone through far worse than I. We will never really know what happened but abuse was evident. I do know we both suffered abuse and neglect for those two years...but for me...it seems I did not go through half what my sister ended up going through.

I so honor my mother. She is my mother. Few people when they are around us ever would guess that she is not my biological Mom. This woman, that already had one baby, then suddenly had three to care for...bravely took on her new charges who had been through so much. She is not perfect...but she took on the responsibility and loved me and through her..I learned more about Jesus.

My love for Jesus was so intense at five. His presence was strong at that time. I thought about Him a lot. I remember so vividly needing Him and wanting Him. I told my Mom this and at five, with the help of my new mother, I kneeled down and prayed and Jesus has never left me since......

melanie

my testimony

It seems that the last ten years have been such a testing season of my life. Allowing God to expose and heal so much inside me, that really I did not know was there. I have to thank God that he does this so slowly...not showing it all and shoving it in my face..but slowly. Here..see this..lets work on this..so loving..so tender. I am not saying it is not painful at times. Oh..it is. I have to say..it is well worth it.

So..I want to share about me. I will break it down...as it will take time and I really want the Holy Spirit to guide me.

My parents married very early. 18 and 16 years old. Too early. They married because my mother was pregnant. Not long after their marriage my mother had my brother. He died only a week or so after he was born. My mother was heartbroken. Immediately..she focused on having another. Me. I was born in '73. Only a few months later..my mother found she was pregnant again. This time with my sister. My Mom, from what I heard, had a very hard childhood herself and was not ready for the responsibility of motherhood and marriage. She was very upset to be with child again so soon. Shortly, after giving birth to my sister she left. I don't know where and I really don't know why. My Dad, now had two little girls to care for. I was 1 1/2 and my sister a newborn. After that..I spent many days with my Dad's mother..my grandmother, while he worked.

I have to say something about my Grandmother. She was the most amazing woman. I believe that it was her prayers that kept me safe as life got very rough on me later on.

When I was only 3..my Mother's mom...came and asked to see us. My Grandmother was against it..but was persuaded otherwise. My sis and I went on a day trip with her...and never returned. My father had no idea where we were. It was not till two years later that a miracle happened and we were found. My mother had put my sister up for adoption and the papers to approve the adoption were sent to my Dad's Mom. Immediately..my Dad and Grandmother went to the authorities and she was ordered to return to the state with me and my sis. We returned and a huge, ugly legal battle ensued.

I do want to note that during the time I was gone..I do not remember much. The things I do remember are not good. Yet..my Grandmother taught me about Jesus before I was taken. During those hard times as a little child..I remember feeling like a bubble of protection was wrapped around me keeping me safe and I knew it was Jesus........

melanie