faith unfaded

I had just gotten myself back together. Again.

But I was Tweety Bird and Satan was Sylvester. I always taw that puddy tat but that didn’t keep me from ending up in his mouth often.

All it took was him slinging some darts of hurt for me to initiate massive self-destruction. This was no exception.

But the stakes were much higher in 2001. Consequences get weightier with time but the weight of the pain on my heart was crushing me and I needed relief.

I decided to join a friend for her birthday weekend in New Orleans. I loved NOLA and had gone to the Saenger often, but this was a different kind of trip.

It started at the hotel in the French Quarter.

Checked in by a “clerk” who spoke words only the Lord knew to say and filled me with Holy Spirit fire as he handed me my room key, I was then encouraged by the “parking lot attendant” two miles away to “forget what that guy said” as he gave me his card, complete with info on obtaining any substance desired. We stored it in the glovebox.

Less than ten minutes later, I followed my friend into a voodoo shop. I was immediately chased out with a broom.

“You can’t come in here. Get out! Get out!” the owner screamed.

My friend looked at me in shock. “What did you do?!”

“Nothing!” My eyes were wide; what did I do wrong? I had an idea of what was happening but I was confused. Can you kick out a customer? People stared. I was humiliated. Also embarrassed and hurt by non-acceptance, a childhood trigger, I decided to imbibe in the smoke I’d been abstaining from.

I was in handcuffs within three minutes.

“My daddy is…” It had worked as a teenager. Maybe it would work as an adult.

It did not.

“That’s nice. Maybe you can call him after we process you…”

I’m in real trouble this time, I thought. It had taken me eight months to rebuild my life and eight hits to completely dismantle it again. I was the mouse who thought he could eat the cheese without danger. I was wrong.

Throwing myself on my knees in the middle of Bourbon Street, it was about me and God alone.

“I’M SORRY! WHAT DID YOU EXPECT ME TO DO AFTER ALL THAT?” I screamed so loud the officers backed up.

“Whoa, whoa, don’t be bringing God into this…” one of them said in the distance.

I couldn’t hear; I didn’t care. My showdown with the Lord was loud and filled with fury. I had made mistakes; I always do. But I’d also been through a fire that I hadn’t built. Getting burnt left me blaming God.

Already calculating how long I’d be in jail and whether or not I’d lose custody of my children, the radio static barely registered through my sobs. In a moment I realized that God works best through the static.

“Well lady, you must have a pretty special relationship with God ‘cause we just got bigger fish to fry.” I stared in shock as the handcuffs were removed from my wrists and the officers simply left like my entire future hadn’t just been in jeopardy.

My friend and I immediately went to the car, cutting our weekend short. We tore up the “business card” on the way home. In true supernatural fashion, the card appeared fully intact on the dashboard as we pulled in her driveway.

We tore it up again but this time she took note of this God I’d been talking about. She joined me at a local church that Sunday and got saved.

Church hurt caused me to prefer to minister on the streets than in church for awhile but God says not to lay that aside.

Not giving up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but encouraging one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching. Hebrews 10:25

I’m now as comfortable speaking in Sunday School as I am in homeless camps. He has healed my hurts and freed me bondage. He has pulled me out of the miry pit and set me on a mountaintop.

Why?

Simply because I let Him.