Someone at the local small church told me I was the lamb of God. I wanted to believe that, and I kept a toy and a blanket that had lambs on them most of my childhood. When we moved back east, my horrible life went from bad to hellacious. I honestly don’t remember when the sexual abuse started, but I remember it as the beginning of my confusing childhood made up of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.
My wife has spent almost 30 years in constant and often unbearable pain. And for many Christians, this just doesn’t fit with the faith they’ve been taught in church. For them, Christianity is about overcoming, not about enduring. It’s about dreams coming true, not shattered dreams. And it’s certainly not about persistent suffering.
In the summer of 2019, we lost my loving Dad at the age of 86 after an extended illness lasting over 10 years. He was a physician. I prayed that he would accept Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior for 15 years, from the moment I realized that he hadn’t. We had attended church my entire childhood and he had “gone to church” his entire life.
I am a 45 year old woman. By the time I became a Christian in 2012 I had lived drug free for 15 years from an addiction that started in my late teens. Active addiction lasted six years until I got help to recover in 1997. This is the story of my life from then to September 2020.