“As your faith is strengthened you will find that there is no longer the need to have a sense of control, that things will flow as they will, and that you will flow with them, to your great delight and benefit.” – Emmanuel Teney

You’ll have to forgive me as I’m not feeling very well today and that’s why this blog is so late in being posted. My chronic fatigue is flaring something awful, to the point I’m wondering if I’m having a true mono episode. But I didn’t want to skip, so please understand if some of this doesn’t make a whole lot of sense.

I grew up in the Catholic faith, but am not of that faith anymore. I’m not here to bash Catholicism, so relax. It was a personal choice, borne more out of how my own father lived the “do as I say but not as I do” credo, and the fact that someone always ended up crying on the way home from church, if not in the lobby. It was not a pleasant experience. There was also something more personal that happened to me in my late teen years that I’m not comfortable sharing in my blog. Let’s just say I needed the church in a big way and it was not there for me. Everyone is human, even churches I’m learning, but at 18 and in a crisis, I couldn’t wrap my brain around that.

So I didn’t attend church for a long time when I went on my own to – of all things – a Catholic college. As a matter of fact, except for weddings and the occasional Christmas mass, I never went to church until I started seeing a therapist after a suicide attempt. He steered me to a protestant church in my area, to the single ministry there. I wasn’t interested in that, but I did go to a Sunday service, the 10:00 – the busiest time there could be – and “just happened” to find a space in the parking lot. My faith doesn’t allow for coincidences anymore. Through that protestant church, I converted my faith and became a born-again Christian on March 5, 1997.

It hasn’t been a straight-road journey, don’t at all let me lead you to believe that. Not all roses and chocolates. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever received a dozen long-stemmed roses in my life! But my faith has taught me that my personal journey wasn’t meant to be straight and narrow. God knows who I am. He, after all, made me. He knows where I am and what I am writing this minute. My faith helps me trust that the doctor tomorrow will find some reason I am feeling so much sicker. Because God made the doctor. And because I will pray for wisdom for the doctor, and He always, ALWAYS answers the prayers of His faithful.

How do I know this? Because God gave me my faith in the first place. I’ll leave you with this poem I found on the internet that just took my breath away.

A drunk man in an Oldsmobile
They said had run the light
That caused the six-car pileup
On 109 that night.

When broken bodies lay about
And blood was everywhere,
The sirens screamed out eulogies,
For death was in the air.

A mother, trapped inside her car,
Was heard above the noise;
Her plaintive plea near split the air:
Oh, God, please spare my boys!”

She fought to loose her pinned hands;
She struggled to get free,
But mangled metal held her fast
In grim captivity.

Her frightened eyes then focused
On where the back seat once had been,
But all she saw was broken glass and
Two children’s seats crushed in.

Her twins were nowhere to be seen;
She did not hear them cry,
And then she prayed they’d been thrown free,
Oh, God, don’t let them die!”

Then firemen came and cut her loose,
But when they searched the back,
They found therein no little boys,
But the seat belts were intact.

They thought the woman had gone mad
And was travelling alone,
But when they turned to question her,
They discovered she was gone.

Policemen saw her running wild
And screaming above the noise
In beseeching supplication,
Please help me find my boys!

They’re four years old and wear blue shirts;
Their jeans are blue to match.”
One cop spoke up, “They’re in my car,
And they don’t have a scratch.

They said their daddy put them there
And gave them each a cone,
Then told them both to wait for Mom
To come and take them home.

I’ve searched the area high and low,
But I can’t find their dad.
He must have fled the scene,
I guess, and that is very bad.”

The mother hugged the twins and said,
While wiping at a tear,
He could not flee the scene, you see,
For he’s been dead a year.”

The cop just looked confused and asked,
Now, how can that be true?”
The boys said, “Mommy, Daddy came
And left a kiss for you.”

He told us not to worry
And that you would be all right,
And then he put us in this car with
The pretty, flashing light.

We wanted him to stay with us,
Because we miss him so,
But Mommy, he just hugged us tight
And said he had to go.

He said someday we’d understand
And told us not to fuss,
And he said to tell you, Mommy,
He’s watching over us.”

The mother knew without a doubt.
That what they spoke was true,
For she recalled their dad’s last words,
I will watch over you.”

The firemen’s notes could not explain
The twisted, mangled car,
And how the three of them escaped
Without a single scar.

But on the cop’s report was scribed,
In print so very fine,
An angel walked the beat tonight
on Hwy. 109
– Unknown

Peace out