The book “No Ordinary Life” will probably never be written, never hit the best seller list, but it is my story and as I look back I see the hand of God in everything.
Many unlikely and sometimes bizarre things have happened in my life. I have never questioned God. I have never been angry. My prayer was always that what ever was happening would eventually be used for His glory. I take back ‘never been angry.’ Once, only a few months ago, when my car wouldn’t start, I was angry. Amazingly, it ended up a miracle, but that is a story for another time.
I understand perfectly the man who said to Jesus, “I believe, help my unbelief.” I want a radical faith. A faith that takes God at His word, a faith that does not waver. I am not there. At times, I catch a realistic glimpse of what is before me and I become very afraid. Like Peter of Bible times, who began to sink in the sea when he took his eyes off Jesus, I too, can flounder.
So, how does someone born on the “bald” prairies of Saskatchewan, Canada end up in the USA building a home of healing for those rescued from sex trafficking?
I grew up in a time when ice cellars and out-houses were in. Where everyone, visitors and family alike, drank out of a common ladle which we dipped in a stone crock filled with water taken from a dugout my grandfather constructed, and it didn’t seem gross. Who knew about germs back then? Not me…didn’t care.
In the winter we rode to church and to town in our horse-drawn sleigh; in the summer we rode in the buggy. I still remember when my father came home with our first car and how proud we all were. I remember the fun that was had by the younger children when our parents would gather to butcher the chickens, pigs or fatted cow. The cracklings and fried potatoes we ate the next morning for breakfast after a poor pig had met its demise, is something I will never forget.
I remember when I learned English, when I thought the wearing of fingernail polish was sure to send someone straight to hell and the thought of a lady showing her knees was … well … frankly … unthinkable.
I remember all those things and much more, but the memory that comes to me more than any is of me standing in our enormous garden eating fresh picked peas. I loved the garden for the delicious things I could eat, but mostly I loved it because I could hide there. The garden was surrounded by tall trees that would sway in the breeze, and with only one entrance, I could quickly hide between the rows of potatoes if I heard someone calling. Finding a place alone with eight other family members was never easy.
I stood there that day, crunching on peas and thinking of far away places and God. I was only five and the day before I had heard a speaker tell exciting stories about traveling to other countries to teach of God’s love. I made up my mind that one day that is exactly what I would do.
We moved from our farm on the wind-blown prairies to a small town in another province of Canada, where I began school. Buses didn’t run in those days so we trudged through mud, blizzards or whatever the weather offered, because parents didn’t “run” in those days either.
I entered grade two and my father, a minister, was offered a job in Oregon. Oregon … another country .. . so far away … so exciting! So exciting that on the days my parents had to drive to the big city to take care of passport things, I started skipping school, young truant that I was! I couldn’t concentrate on anything and school seemed impossible to attend. Finally, when my teacher punished me on a day that I did attend, for staring out the window daydreaming instead of doing my reading, I never returned to class. She is probably still wondering what happened to me. We moved to Oregon the next week.
On the surface things seemed innocent and pure, yet there was an underbelly of injustice and evil. My oldest brother, now passed, was raped when he was 10. Not once, but repeatedly. There was the neighbor that did “odd” things that I never quite understood until I was older. Then at 13, I was coerced into a sexual relationship that lasted over a year.
It affected my life and choices in ways that I will probably never completely understand. Because of it, at 14, I considered becoming a prostitute. I was so certain the experience had ruined my life.
I made wrong choices in marriage, sometimes deliberately disobeying God’s directions. I often contemplated suicide when I felt I had no place to go for help; no one to talk to.
Pain, depression, and loneliness were my constant companions because I was afraid to speak out. What would people think? Would they blame me? I was embarrassed and even more than that, I was too proud.
One day as I sat in the back yard of our home in complete despair, I cried out to God to help me. Unbidden, the words, ‘talk to someone’ came to me. Talking to someone had actually never occurred to me.
I did find someone to talk to. It began a process of healing that took years to complete. I can honestly say my past is healed. Talking with counselors, listening friends and family all helped, but in the end what healed me was my relationship with Jesus Christ.
Approximately five years ago my life began to fall apart. About that time I remember going to the bank and after cashing a few checks, thinking about all the money I had here and there and that now I had more to add to my “cash stash” … I heard a still small voice say: “I am taking it all.” What do you say to that? I said, “OK” little knowing what “all” meant.
Within the next few years, I lost both my parents, my two favorite cousins, uncles, aunts, a person that had been a significant part of my life since we were 12, some friends, my source of income and I almost lost my life. I lost my health for the better part of a year through a freak set of circumstances and after ending up in the hospital I also lost my “cash stash” and became deeply in debt. I lost my marriage, my home, many of my personal belongings and my dog died.
I wanted to kill myself. Some of us by temperament are suicidal. I am one of those.
While staying with my son who lives on the 14th floor of a high-rise apartment I couldn’t go out on his deck because I would hear, “Go ahead jump, it will be all over…. nothing to worry about, you won’t feel a thing … jump.”
Obviously I did not jump. Obviously things have changed. What happened?
In my anguish I sought after God with all my heart and in the end my losses brought me on my face before God. I felt that God had placed me in a dark room, shoved Satan in after me, looked the door, and thrown the keys away. Finally when it seemed that it could get no darker I prayed this prayer, “God, no matter if this is to be my life, I will believe that you are with me and I will trust you and believe in you no matter what.”
I would love to say that all the lights came on that my life was magically changed. It wasn’t but what I did learn was that God was with me. I learned that God is in everything, that troubles come to drive us to Him and that when we let go we can put our trials in perspective and when we keep our eyes on Him, it changes everything.
Jesus said that in this life we will have tribulation. Where is God when your loved one dies? Where is He when you lose your health? Where is He when you don’t have money to pay the bills? Where is He when your heart is broken and you think you can’t bear another burden? Where is He when rape and abuse happens?
I will tell you where He is! The same place that He was when His Son hung on the cross. Did Jesus deserve what he received? Certainly not and what He suffered was so much worse than anything we will ever face.
It is in our sufferings that we become like Christ. It is in our sufferings that we learn to know the heart of God, if we allow them to drive us to Him.
Over a year ago I ended up working for a non-profit in downtown LA with survivors of sex trafficking. Once I learned to love these women and learned that this is a problem that deeply affects this country, this state, and the cities of Eugene and Springfield, I knew that I could do no less than dedicate the rest of my life to this issue.
It is in our negatives that we find the positive that we are looking for. Don’t shrink away, don’t become a victim of your circumstances, don’t allow your enemy who goes around seeking to destroy and devour to take you down and out.
God is there and He is waiting to show you that through your pain is life. What lies on the other side, if you dare to trust God in it, is what you are looking for.
I have never been a person that went around saying how much I loved God. When I began to be able to say that was when I learned that God speaks to the destitute on the street. In the most despicable of circumstances He is there. Jesus hung out with the prostitutes in Bible days and He still does.
Finally, troubles come so that we can have a heart for others. There is not a thing that happened to me that God is not using.
Recently I began Hope Ranch Ministries to set up a home to heal survivors of the sex trafficking trade. God is opening doors that I could never have imagined. He has prepared me my entire life for this moment and He had to take those things I would not let go of so that He could safely use me.
“If we have no peace, it is because we have forgotten that we belong to each other. ”
Mother Teresa
We are his hands, his feet, his voice. If you feel God tugging at your heart to get involved in helping these women, please contact us. No talent, no gift is too small.
