Intervention

Probably 4 or 5 years back, I heard God speak to me.

Now I know it wasn't actually out loud, but it was so loud in my head that it took me a bit to realize that it wasn't actually out loud. It was a mid-summer Monday evening, nearing 8:30, and I was headed up 5th Street to pick up Doober from boy scouts. I passed the library, and was nearing the next intersection. Just as I accelerated slightly to get through the green light, a voice very loudly and clearly said, "STOP!"

I immediately hit the brakes, and then shook my head a bit, wondering why I had that sudden urge to brake for a green light. I began to accelerate once again, and again I heard that voice call out, "STOP!" I braked again, though not quite as quickly this time. I couldn't figure out why I kept hearing a voice telling me to stop when the light was green.

Just that quickly, a car flew through the red light immediately in front of me. Had I not braked those two times, it would have hit me directly in my driver's side door. And I suspect, given his speed, that I would have been either severely injured or killed.

When the car was gone, I shakily accelerated again and made my way through the intersection. And once through, I pulled into a parking spot along the road and just shook for a few minutes.

I know that God doesn't always intervene. I believe he could, but I know he doesn't. Good people like my sister get cancer, just like bad people get cancer. Good people like my brother are paralyzed in car accidents, just like bad people. Good people like the biology professor at my college are murdered in random burglaries, just like bad people.

But sometimes, God does intervene. And it's an amazing thing to be one of the lucky ones to experience it personally. I know that God spoke to me that night... that for some reason, He chose to intervene. I don't know what he saved me for, but perhaps someday I'll figure it out.

Open your eyes

I realized a while back that I went to church weekly, and left without having a clue what the minister said. I went through the motions but got nothing out of it, and gave nothing to it either.

Well, I vigorously (usually) sang my tenor part in the hymns. But that was about it.

So over the winter when I was struggling so hard to figure out what to do with my marriage, I began each service with a prayer, asking that I would hear one thing that God wanted me to hear. And oddly... I did. Every time, I got a message... some of the more memorable ones were:

• Don't define yourself by your failures.
• God loves us too much to leave us where we are at.
• God provides what you really need, if you just ask Him for help.

And a week ago, the message was one I hadn't considered before: that I need to make that request daily, not weekly. God has a message for us every day... something new we can learn... a different way to see things. It doesn't just come from a church service.

And all we have to do is ask, and then open our eyes to that message.

A message from God

Today, as I sat down at the beginning of the church service, I said a little prayer... that God would give me something that I need to hear from the service. Turns out he had two messages for me.

First, he gave me a verse:

So don't worry about tomorrow, because tomorrow will have its own worries. Each day has enough trouble of its own. Matthew 6:34

So today, I thought about each of the things that I am worrying about. One at a time, mostly, except that they kept interrupting each other. Run-on worries, are kind of like run-on sentences. They keep going and going, until they end up as this huge tangled yarn-ball of worry.

I sat back to try to separate the worries into individual pieces. How will I tell my daughter? What and how do I tell my parents and brothers & sister? Will I get the house that I want to put an offer on? When will I find someone that I can just call when I need someone to sit with or get a hug from? How will I move my piano? (Yes, my worries can be pretty specific, or even petty, at times.

And as I named each of those worries, the knots began to loosen in me, just like that yarn-ball beginning to untangle. I could see that I've been grouping a whole month or more of worries into one big worry ball. So it's ok to just worry about the first worry on the list, and let the rest come in their own time.

And the other message I got was from this video, that was shown during the sermon.

God loves us too much to leave us where we are at.

God loves me too much to leave me where I am at. This will pass.

Takin' the high road

Let's have a little talk about God.

He and I have been getting a lot closer these days, since I came back and told him what a mess I had been. We talk a lot. I ask a lot of questions and make a few requests here and there too. Things like:

Help me survive today.
And tomorrow too, while you're at it. Please?

I'm no saint. I made some pretty big screw-ups in the past 10-plus years while my marriage sucked. I didn't consider divorce to be an option, so I looked for ways to survive the present. And some of them were glaringly WRONG ways.

I found online friends who I could talk to: friends who supported me, time and time again, while I was falling apart. And I found other friends who supported me while relationships with other friends who had supported me fell apart. Through the years, some of these friends were kind of left along the wayside, probably because they were tired of my constant neediness and apparent inability to do anything to fix the situation.

I can't blame them. I annoyed myself too. Still do, some days. But I'm trying... really I am.

Somehow, when I finally said those three big words to one really special friend, everything finally started falling into place. (Not the three little words... the three BIG words)

You were right.

Trust me, those can be some really big words to have to say. But if you say them... if you really look at yourself, and admit that you were wrong... really face the path you've been on and admit it's not working... really turn around and face the path that you should have taken 10-plus years before... things start to fall into place.

God has sent me some pretty amazing validations over the past few months...

• Support and validation when I needed it, in any number of areas from many different people.
• The ability to finally begin to work full-time after working part time for over 18 years (more income is always a good thing when in this situation! And yes, I had asked before, but was always told, "It's not in the budget".)
  
• A supportive boss.
• An even more supportive minister, who during my first meeting with him told me, "It's ok to put down the cross and forgive yourself."
  
• The above-mentioned friend and recipient of those three words being there for me, day in and day out, to support me when I didn't feel that I had the strength to keep on this path.
• The ability to finally begin to see and recognize the many tactics my husband used... the ones that kept me confused and trapped for so many years.
• Finding the perfect books to help me see what I needed to see.
• A casual friend who started a book club at just the time I needed, so I could begin to make some local friends.
• A reduction in price to my price range on the house that I fell in love with just from the photos on the listing.

Don't get me wrong. It's been a tough, lonely path so far. There were a few glaring episodes of lack of support from people I expected to be there for me. And I know it will continue to be tough for some time. But I think God's glad enough to see me on this path that he's granting a few extra favors along the way.

And the right path, even when lonely, feels so much more right than the wrong path.