Hem Touching Moments

  Call Out To God

As an adult, there was a time in my life that I felt like I was going crazy because of the PTSD that ruled over my thoughts and I felt very alone. While listening to a CD my mentor Glenda Peters gave me, I learned that God makes beauty from ashes. So I cried out to Him and asked him to do that in my life. Since then God has given my kids and I a process of healing and love for each other that I never thought possible. Only needing to lay down everything that brought me to this point of brokenness built by  my flesh.

You may be wondering why I had PTSD, or what brought me to this place in life. In my younger years there were a few ideas that started a trajectory in my life that sent me in a dangerous direction. 1- Find a guy to take care of you. 2- Reba Mc Entire had a song out called “Fancy.” There was a line in it that told her to be nice to the gentleman, and they’ll be nice to her. I wasn’t given an example of what to look for in a gentleman or how to make difficult decisions. 3-I began to find friends that were getting attention from guys, after a while I started to act and dress like them. You can see where this is going.

A bit later at age 17 I was very intoxicated and spending time with one of my abusers. They asked me to do something I didn’t want to do so I yelled, NO! They slapped me across the face and called me names. These names stuck with me and further impacted who I thought I was and the choices that were forming my identity. Words that pushed me further into the dangerous territory I had already found. In this moment it was hard for me to stand without stumbling around and boldly prayed for strength to get out of this dangerous situation. Running to the door in the most ridiculous platform heels they grabbed me by my shirt to keep me from escaping. It slowed me down so I prayed again and the shirt ripped almost through. Finding myself in the safety of my car, I drove to a place that I visited regularly in the weeks leading up to this late night. The sound of cars speeding past was relaxing to me. A place that my friends had shown me, for a thrill during the day we’d walk across both lanes of traffic and hide in the shadows when reaching the other side. This is where I’d visit when searching for a place that invited me in, unlike the youth group I attended for a time or when I wanted to disappear because of the trouble that found me every time I turned around. This trouble is what still makes me question if I’m really forgiven, or can become who God’s word says I am.

When my car came to a stop in the ditch I shut off the engine and climbed the steep hill in my heels and ripped shirt, full of despair and brokenness. My legs didn’t stop until they reached the center of the right lane. There were car lights pointing at me, a bit more than 20 feet away. This was a choice made from my free will, not where God directed me to go after He gave me enough strength to get away from the abuser. After realizing the trouble I had gotten myself into, yelled dear God help me! This is my “Hem Touching Moment.” While my heart pounded, there was something in the sky coming toward me. I heard the sound of very strong wings and my reaction was to swear because it startled me. After the white wings surrounded me on all sides I was scared and searching for a way out. I was hitting and pulling on feathers the length of my forearm. This was a reaction built from always finding trouble and not knowing why. Sounds then came down from heaven, seemingly in a way that we see rays of sun streaming down to earth through clouds. My earthly words will never come close to describing the sounds I heard. It wasn’t clear to me if this was an instrument or sound coming from voices. There were so many layers of delicate harmony passing over each other in a way that I’d never heard before loud then so quiet, creating a need to draw closer, so many sounds then unison. Craving more and wanting to see where this was coming from, I tried to climb the walls of feathers surrounding me. The angel then set me back on the pavement telling me to be careful because the car was really close. The angel spoke of God by names I didn’t recognize, speaking softness to my heart. Then saying God has a lot for me to do here, very important things, it’s not time for me to leave yet. The angel left as I heard the strong wings ascending. The car’s left headlight was within inches of my left knee. I heard my heels clacking around on the pavement, bringing me back to the reality that surrounded me. The driver was confused because there were no skid marks, he “just stopped.” He had a lot of questions for me that I could not answer. He then said we should get off the road because it was dangerous. After he gave me a shirt, he brought me home.

A few verses that helped my journey are

Romans 8:18 I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us.

Romans 8:36-37 As it is written: “For our sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered,” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us.

While preparing to write this I came across. Jeremiah 18:2-4 “Go down to the potter’s house, and there I will give you my message.” So I went down to the potter’s house, and saw him working at the wheel. But the pot he was shaping from the clay was marred in his hands’ so the potter formed it into another pot, shaping it as seemed best to him.

Nahum 1:2 The Lord is a jealous and avenging God; the Lord takes vengeance and is filled with wrath. The Lord takes vengeance on his foes and vents his wrath against his enemies.

Galatians 5:13- You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh’ rather, serve one another humbly in love.

Each of these have deep meaning to me and are yet another piece that has helped my process of healing and changing into a new creation! When I find more times of trouble from my past, current brokenness or wrong motives, my Savior is always ready to tell me I am forgiven. He does have good plans for me and when each item of my life is submitted to Him, it gets reborn into something that is only possible because of the work that Jesus Christ did on the cross so long ago. I’m so thankful for Him and the work that He will always be doing in me as I learn hard things in this world!