CHAPTER FIVE

 

WASTED YEARS

I titled this Wasted Years instead of My Wilderness Years for this reason. There are two ways we can enter into a wilderness

1. God leads us there, for a time of drawing closer to Him.

2. We find ourselves there because we have chosen to do our own thing apart from God.

But much like the parable of the prodigal son I took my inheritance and wasted on years of rebellious living.

CHAPTER FIVE

Psalm 51:2 Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity, and cleanse me from my sin

Psalm 51:12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation, And uphold me by Your generous Spirit 

Actually all of Psalm 51 was my prayer so many many years ago. I used to call these years of running from God into the waiting arms of the world, my Wilderness Years and they were, but most of all they were Wasted Years, where I forgot who I really was, a child of God, I had been set free from the bondage of sin and the world, but in my anger I found myself once more chained to sin and the world. Recently I received a word that spoke of me about this time; what and how did it speak to me? It was (in my interpretation) because of feeling of being rejected by my husband, that he no longer wanted me as a wife, a spirit of rejection came upon my mind oppressing me, I didn't recognize it and agreed with it, I developed an unsatisfying thirst to quench my thirst of rejection. That thirst sent me into the world to look for satisfaction in the pleasures of the world.

When my husband no longer wanted me and our marriage ended, waiting in the sidelines was a married man who did want me. And I made the decision to be in an affair with someone else's husband, I became the other woman. As hard as I tried to replace him with other men I would be interested in, the truth was none could replace him. My sin was ever before me, and it was both spiritually and physically killing me. That spirit of depression, came with a spirit of despair and suicide. I was in constant torment that effected my children, my job and all who came around me. The voice playing over in my head was saying "Your only escape is death"! I attempted twice unsuccessfully to kill myself. Now let me share how even in my sin God would not let me die like that. Listen to my story:

I had been seeing a psychologist that my primary care doctor wanted me to see, trying to help me with my depression etc. His office was in an old home near Lakeshore Mental Hospital, how convenient. No one was there on the weekend, so one Sunday I had driven up to the mountains I had bought the largest bottle of extra strength Tylenol, and began to take them. But I realized I didn't need to be driving and become a danger to others. So I went to my doctor's office took the whole bottle, got out of the car, went into the back laid down under a shade tree to die. Before long my doctor came upon me shook me awake and put me on a swing on the front porch. He was mowing the yard and he would stop to come and check on me. After he finished mowing, he came and sat with me, he told me he has never mowed the yard before, they had a young man who came and did the mowing, but he was sick Saturday and he said that he just suddenly thought he needed to go mow right now. And finding me he kept me awake. Did you see what God did? He talked to my primary care doctor and they highly recommended I enter into what is called a psychiatric ward in a regular hospital. I agreed and stayed a week, nothing changed, I would go into rages actually threw a chair at one of the male nurses. So they sent me packing because I was too violent. Hmmmm but wasn't that why I was there? Oh and though I had taken about 50 pills, I suffered no physical problems from the experience.

I would like to say that I began to get better but I didn't, I quit my job went to work in another grocery store as a deli/bakery manager. Hoping the change would help me, but it truly didn't. I went back and forth with this for twelve long years. My children grown and I had let them down as a mother and a role model, the two youngest were 10 and 11 when this chapter of my life began and to their young eyes they could not see Jesus in me at all. I would take them and drop them off at church near where we lived and they would leave salvation tracts for me to see laying all over the house. 

As my children were now grown, I sold my home, bought a new home and my mother who was approximately 83 years old moved in with me. She lived with me for 10 years until she went to her eternal home. During these years, my oldest sister died at 56 years of a lung disease. I now had 3 grandchildren. And I was still looking for love in all the wrong faces.

I was now back with the company I had been with before, and there was this new young lady that worked there, she was the one that changes the price tags and keeps all of that up to date on the shelves. She was a new Christian and so excited for the Lord, we became friends and I remembered what I was missing. One day I woke up from wallering in the filth of the world and I came back to my senses and I began my journey home to my Father. It was no coincidence that this younger girl was placed in my store and she was drawn to me and I was to her, this was a God thing to remind me of what I had been missing in my relationship with Jesus. This journey took about a year, but I was not seeing the man or any man anymore. But I needed God to help me by keeping him away from me. And I prayed and God heard and answered. I also knew a day would come when I would have to have strength to say "No"! And then I got a 5am phone call, "that said if he was coming in my direction, he would call me and I could meet him". I hung up and prayed "God send him the other way and give me the strength to say no more"! Early the next morning I got a phone call, out of curiosity I asked "why did you not call me back yesterday"? His reply "I went the other way". Then I said "No more I cannot see you anymore"! Did you see what God did?  And just like that it ended.  Ultimately we have to choose to say NO MORE, or we remain tied to our past. But I couldn't stand myself and all the wasted years I was unworthy to be called a Christian. I cried out to God, "How can You still love me after all I have said, all I have done. Show me You love me!" I was 50 years old when I said these words and I can honestly say that here we are 24 years later and everyday, God continually shows me He loves me. I began to go to a church and become active in it, and it was here I began to heal. And I could now begin the process of forgiving myself. 

I was the rebellious daughter, who came to her senses, and made my way back to the love of my life, Jesus; you see rebellion will send us into places and doing things that we would never have thought we would do, the word Prodigal means: "one who returns." In His grace, mercy and love He extended to me, I found forgiveness that I knew I didn't deserve. But that is who our God is. When we acknowledge and confess our sins and in faith repent from it, we are forgiven. In every chapter of my life God over and over again showed me His great love for me, yet in these years I wasted I knew I didn't deserve for Him to love me anymore and yet, He never stopped and never will stop loving me.

Thankful that God never let go of me but allowed me to run and then He drew me back to where I belonged. And I never ran again. Though I may stumble, and even fall, I get back up, because I know who my God is. I am His and He is mine.

Previously I talked about the Lure of Witchcraft in I think Chapter Three. When Satan entices us/lures us, he has spent time watching us. From the very beginning of my life God had a plan for me; as for you, and Satan will see us and will attempt to draw us away from God's plan and into his kingdom of darkness. As a believer he cannot take us to hell but he can remove us from our fellowship with Jesus. Satan saw a desire I had to be wanted, he saw my hurt, my anger and he cast out a lure that I latched onto. Satan comes to steal, kill and to destroy. Read James 1:13-16

2 Timothy 2:13 If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself