My Journey to jesus

Psalm 40:2
American Standard Version (ASV)
2 He brought me up also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay;
And he set my feet upon a rock, and established my goings.

One September Sunday morning in 1989, I got up and dressed.   I had made up my mind, I was going to church.  At the end of our street in Smyrna, Georgia there was a little Baptist Church.  I had passed it often in the three years that I had lived in my neighborhood. Every time I passed that church I would have the thought, that I need to go back to church.  Although I had grown up going to church, I had not been in a church for almost 10 years and that was for a christening of a friend’s child.  My husband and I had filled our life with many things that did not include church.  We spent our Sunday’s reading the newspaper, resting from the work week and occasionally traveling to visit friends or family.

But this Sunday, I made a decision to try something different.  The previous three years had been very stressful.  We had built the house of our dreams and it had turned into a nightmare.  Our builder had made some serious mistakes building our house and we were left trying to fix the issues ourselves. Daily we were reminded of our mistake in choosing this builder by watching our front porch crack and begin to lean away from the front of the house.  We then made the decision to sue the builder to force him to pay for some of the problems but this process added even more stress to our lives.

I also had a dream that was beginning to slip away from me as I approached 40.  I had a desire to be a mother that would not go away.   In 1969 I got pregnant during my senior year of high school.  I knew I had nothing to give a child so I made the decision to give up my son for adoption.  I later married in 1970 and in 1980 I had a tubal pregnancy and was left with only a small chance of having a child again.  In 1985, my husband and I pursued invitro-fertilization.  We were on the list getting ready for the treatments when my husband decided he didn’t want to go through with the process he considered to be a science experiment.  While I was blessed with a loving husband and a good job, I just could not let the dream of being a mother go.  My husband finally agreed to adopt and I began putting our name on every list I could find.

We were turned down by the State of Georgia adoption agency because by that time my husband, who was four years older than me was considered too old.  When I applied to the Catholic Adoption agency, we were turned down.  I found a Christian Adoption Agency, but they wanted my testimony.  I didn’t have one!  We finally put our name on a list of an organization that required us to house a pregnant girl who was planning to give up her child for adoption.  We were told the list was long and it may take three years to work our way up the list.  We were willing to do anything, so we put our name on the list and waited.  Then one of my friends at work had friends who adopted a baby independently.  I was encouraged that this way of adoption might be possible when I talked to the new mom as she was feeding her baby.  I wrote letters letting everyone know my husband and I wanted to adopt.  We were told to share those letters with our friends and family.  My sister shared her letter with her doctor and I got a call from the State Attorney General of North Carolina telling me that it was illegal to advertise for a baby in North Carolina and if I didn’t stop writing letters to people in North Carolina, I would be arrested!

So on a Sunday in September, 1989, I got in my car thinking I might find some answers for my problems at church.  This was a conscious decision to take a step in a different direction than what I had tried in the past.  I didn’t realize then, I had tried my way for nearly 40 years and now I was making a decision to try God’s way.  While sitting at the stoplight in front of the little church I had planned to attend, I saw some people standing outside smoking and I started thinking I didn’t want to walk through a crowd of people smoking! Just then a silver church van from the Smyrna First Methodist Church drove by.  The sign on the back of the van read, Follow me to church! So I followed!  I walked into that church and immediately as the music began, I started to cry and I could not stop!  I wanted to crawl under the pew but didn’t see a way to do that.  An older lady in the seat beside me just started patting my shoulder.  The music took me back to a time in church as a child when I made a decision to follow Jesus. 

I continued going to that Methodist church and was befriended by Lindy, the choir director.  She probably watched me weep through the first service I attended and decided I needed some help.  She asked me how she could pray for me and I told her of my dream to adopt.  She began to pray and I began to be hopeful again!  Two months later, during the first week of December 1989, I got a call about a baby that was available for adoption. My husband and I were so excited!  One of the letters we had written to our friends had produced an opportunity to adopt a child independently.  We had to wait for the contact to go through our lawyer and I began one of my first lessons in trusting God.  My beautiful daughter, Molly, was born on January 7, 1990 and I held her in my arms two days later.  There was no doubt in my mind that this child was an incredible gift from God!

I often wonder what my life would be like if I had not made the decision to follow that Church van.   What if I did not decide to trust Jesus and choose God’s way to live my life?  What would my life be like?  When I made a decision to follow the Creator of the Universe and His Son, Jesus Christ, my life was changed forever!  God heard my cry and answered my prayer.  God has filled my life with children! I am the mother of two wonderful children, the grandmother of 6 grandchildren, and the great grandmother of a precious little boy!   With God, all things are possible!