The Flame Within

Today I deactivated my FB account!  If you know me, you know this is a {big} deal!  I have friends from all over the world, very close friends, and utilize FB as a means of keeping in touch with long distance friends and family.  Over the past several months I’ve noticed a feeling of discontentment in my heart.  I’ve payed close attention to this feeling and have noticed these discontented emotions are worse after scrolling through my newsfeed.  Today, I received a personal message via instant messenger, and it became clear immediately;  “Facebook is actually feeding hate, judgement, resentment, anger, and discontentment amongst people!”  To be fair, I will rephrase this to, people are using “social media” as a means of feeding hate, resentment, anger, and discontentment in people’s lives and in relationships.  After receiving and replying to this particular message, I began thinking, “The way people communicate with others on social media, is nothing like they’d communicate in person.”  Due to the lack of physical proximity in a conversation, people are more likely to attack someone for their beliefs, call someone out in a rude manner, not know someone personally, and are entirely less likely to filter communication and words.

The 2016 election just took place 3 days ago and a true and unexpected {miracle} took place;  Donald J. Trump became the president elect over the well known life-long politician Hillary Clinton.  The republicans basically won the White House, from president to the senate, and the house!  This is huge!  For evangelicals “like myself”, this is a {huge} prayer answered!  Unfortunately, Hillary Clinton supporters were lead to believe by the mainstream media and biased polls, that she’d win by a landslide!  Yet, God had other plans and Donald Trump won the presidency of the United States of America, in a political miracle few have seen in their lifetimes.  As you can imagine, like many other relieved and excited evangelicals, my Facebook posts have predominantly focused on this wonderful achievement by Donald Trump, his campaign, and the Americans whom voted him in!  Unfortunately, what is stealing the focus of the media, isn’t Donald Trump’s miraculous win, or his plans for America’s future; The center of the news media rests on the liberal millennials evil attacks on our nation!  Videos of hatred, violence, burning cities, burning of the American flag, people screaming obscene and horrendous words at Trump and his supporters, and an absolute disregard for America.  The most upsetting aspect is the manner in which universities and other liberal entities are coddling these {overly} upset Hillary supporters, which is only fueling anger, rather than shutting down these outrageous behaviors!  In my frustration with violence and hatred, I made a statement via a Facebook post,  “Time to get back to work!  Life’s what happens when you have other plans!  When Obama won twice, those against him didn’t completely come unglued and begin rioting, burning cities and flags, or standing in streets with obscene signage, all while screaming and causing a ruckus within cities.  Time to put this behind you for the sake of our nation and handle disappointments like adults.  I know all to well what it feels like to have your presidential campaign lose an election, as we lost to Obama 2 times, and have spent 8 years being hushed, disregarded, and having anti-christian policies shoved down our throats.  However, I prayed, and endured!  Life is 10% what happens to you and 90 % how you react!  Stop being cry babies and go back to class!”  This was the post that fueled a young woman to send me a private message via Facebook.

Let’s talk about this personal message…  A well intended young woman sent me a message, basically stating, “As a counselor you should have more empathy and be more understanding to the those rioting (the acts of violence and hatred permeating the streets of this country, huh?).  It is important you understand the reason why people are so upset and not call them cry babies!  I  and other people are literally scared for our lives! ” (Although, nothing about Donald Trump being elected in the past 3 days, is sending a message that anyone’s lives are seriously in danger)  The most upsetting part of her message was,  in a nutshell, “Your a privileged white Christian middle class woman, who can’t possibly understand, because everything has always been easy for you.”  (These are just a few highlights of the message, it is not necessary to disclose the entire message.) Although, I don’t think she intended to attack me in so many personal areas of my life, my mothering, my career, my faith, and my ability to be empathetic, it certainly felt like an attack!  I responded to her message in the kindest way I possibly could, while also explaining that the evangelical community has experienced the same fears over the past 8 years.  I attempted in my response to her,  to bring some kind of peace to the situation.

As the day progressed, I thought about her words!  In particular, I thought about her comment regarding my being a “privileged white Christian middle class woman”.

This young lady only knows me from afar, we may have said a few words across the foyer at church, but she certainly doesn’t know me!  She doesn’t know my story!  You see, all she sees is me today, the happily married woman, married to an amazing Godly husband, with four of the cutest children in the world, carrying a Coach purse, a Bible, and a smile on my face!  Other than what she sees from the outside, she doesn’t know the story of my childhood abuse, my severe PTSD struggles from those first 16 years of abuse, nor the fact that I pretty much raised myself from childhood into adulthood!  She doesn’t know I had bruises on my body most of the time as a child, or the fact that my heart was bruised tremendously more than my body.  She doesn’t know that my step-father was the worst alcoholic.  Nor does she know that my step-father and my mother spent almost every night in a bar, into the wee hours of the morning.  She wasn’t there when I was only 5 years old and my 7 year old brother and I, put ourselves to bed every night and awaited for the sound of an intruder, or worse an overly drunk and uncontrollable step-father!  She doesn’t know that I was the youngest of 7 children and that I emotionally lost all my siblings to drug addiction.  And… she doesn’t even know that I sat in a hospital room and watched my sister leave this world at the young age of 38 from alcoholism, when I was only 20 years old.  She certainly doesn’t know that it took years to build a positive name for myself, rather than being prejudged by the sins of my family members.  She doesn’t know that I pretty much fought for everything I have in life!  She doesn’t know that I {literally} paid my own way through college, from food, shampoo, toiletries, and my own car payments and gas.  She doesn’t know the years I lay in bed, feeling alone and wanting nothing more than to kill myself to end the emptiness within my heart.  She doesn’t know that my biological father chose throughout my childhood and teenage years to want nothing to do with me, or that to this very day he still wants nothing to do with his daughter.  She doesn’t know that I accepted Christ at the age of 15 and without my faith, my life would have turned out much differently!  She doesn’t know that God literally saved me and plucked me out of an abusive and dysfunctional family.  She doesn’t know that my faith is my EVERYTHING!  She doesn’t know that without God and his love for a lost, battered, broken, and lonely little girl; I certainly wouldn’t be the “me” I am today… the middle age church going mother, who walks through the church with a smile on my face, a Coach bag hanging from my shoulder, a Bible in my hand, holding the hand of the most handsome and wonderful husband, and laughing at my 4 adorable children!  Unfortunately, she doesn’t know the sacrifices, pain, heartache, and sweat that went into becoming the woman she sees today.  She doesn’t know… does she?

My salvation story is extreme and literally saved my life!  When my faith is under attack by an anti-christian government, I will take a stand!  I refuse to allow the God who saved my soul, to be hindered by an agenda that seeks all tolerance, except tolerance of Christianity. This doesn’t make me a judgemental middle class white woman, who doesn’t understand privilege!  I understand privilege, all right!  I understand that the God who reigns in America, walked alongside me, paved the way for me, and is the reason I succeeded in my life and overcame the unfortunate events of the past.

Privileged in the world’s understanding… I was not!  Privileged in the eyes of the Heavenly father who loves me completely and saved my battered heart… I am!

Philippians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!”

Proverbs 16:3 “Commit to the Lord in all that you do, and he will establish your plans!”

Election 2016 – Violence & Hatred