My Testimony

 This is my testimony which I wrote out when a friend asked for it to share on her blog in late 2022 or early 2023. She has now taken down her blog and so I thought I would share it here. It is very lengthy - sorry about that! I'm not given to few words.

My family at the Jackpine Retreat 2023

 I was born into a family with Christian parents who love Jesus, study and follow the Bible and are very involved at church. I was blessed with a very happy childhood where I was homeschooled along with my 5 siblings. My parents were careful to train us and for the most part we were an easy going group. Though we certainly messed up from time to time and needed discipline there weren’t any great and obvious mess-ups in our lives. That sort of situation is what we would all hope for our children but it can lead to pride and feelings of being good on our own. I struggled with that as a child (for that matter at times as an adult). Though I knew that Christ had died for my sins I struggled for a while at not feeling like I had done anything truly bad enough to need His sacrifice. From the age of 12 to 14 I was however under conviction of my need to die to my old life and be buried with Christ in baptism, have my sins washed away and rise to walk a new life with the Holy Spirit living inside of me. Finally at 14 I did publicly make that confession of my need and I was baptized. What a feeling of relief!

   God kept working in my life to help me grow in my faith.  There was a life changing moment a couple of years later; I was singing and playing hymns at the piano and as I was singing the song “I’d Rather Have Jesus” and the words “I’d rather have Jesus than men’s applause, I’d rather be faithful to His dear cause… I’d rather have Jesus than anything this world affords today.” really hit home to me and I started weeping. I’d been one to appreciate the applause of people in my making of music and other areas too, but at this time I decided that no matter what, it was Jesus and following Him that mattered in my life. Other things I did would be to glorify Him. I have not lived that out perfectly. I do get distracted at times but having made that decision early on in my life has been such a blessing to me.

   After graduation from highschool, I went off to Bible college and was super blessed with the things I was able to learn and the friendships that I gained. Many of those friends still encourage me in my walk with Jesus and I am super grateful for that. I also met Ken, the man I would marry in my Junior year of college. He was also going to Bible college. He was very passionate about studying God’s word, praying and seeking to lead others to Jesus. He fit all the criteria that I was looking for in a mate and so after much prayer and seeking God’s leading we were married in December of 1998. A little over 9 months later our daughter Maranatha was born. During this time there was an experience that helped me grow in my faith in prayer and the working of God. One evening Ken and I had been standing in line waiting for a while and we struck up a conversation with another young couple that was waiting near us. We had a great visit and we sensed in them a hunger to know God better. But the waiting in line came to an end and we ended up leaving without even learning their names. I felt that God had directed us all to be there for a purpose and that we hadn’t truly finished the conversation and so I prayed earnestly that we would come in contact with them again. A couple of weeks later I was at work one day (a florist shop)  and out of the blue my boss told me he needed my help that afternoon taking care of the plants at the clinic. This was something I had never known anybody from our shop to do before and I certainly had never helped with it but off we went. I am sure you have already guessed who I ran into there. The man had brought their baby girl in to get her immunizations and it was bothering him so much to see her cry that he was out wandering around. We had a quick visit. I said I wished we could visit with them more. He gave me contact information. Later we got in touch with them, we started having Bible studies and after a while both he and his wife were baptized into Christ. We both left that town shortly thereafter and I haven’t kept in contact but I believe God was at work and I am so grateful to have been a part of it. God has an amazing sense of timing!

   We ended up moving to Kansas to help with a church plant there in 2000. After a while I was pregnant with our second child. Ken had dealt with a bit of depression at times and I think I noticed that he was dealing with that a little in the Spring of 2001 but there wasn’t anything majorly different about him. He still seemed on fire for God. But one day he came home (from a youth rally down in Oklahoma that I hadn’t been able to go to) and told me he didn’t think he was going to heaven, his faith was gone, God wasn’t listening to him and he wasn’t going to pretend any more. I was in shock. I was terrified and very sad for Ken and our family. This was not what I signed up for. I had “done everything right” in looking for a spouse. Our whole marriage was based on serving God together, what would happen now? How was I going to raise our children to love Jesus if their Dad didn’t? Ken was willing to keep going to church with me for my sake and for the kids (and he did off and on for the next few years - the kids were little enough though that none of them remember that) but he didn’t want to go to the small church plant that we had been going to. Thankfully there were a lot of good churches in that area and so at his desire we hopped around from church to church for the next few months. I think God directed us to go to the church of Christ in Derby one Sunday morning where we sat through a class where the teacher shared statistics on the probability of kids loving Jesus and being involved in church when they are older. Those statistics were not good. Even if both parents were christians there are a lot of kids that don’t remain faithful, if it is just the Dad influencing them to follow Jesus it was yet worse and if it was just the Mom the statistics were horrible. I was devastated. How was I going to do this? I wanted children that followed Jesus. We went home and that afternoon I had quite the talk with God. I acknowledged that I couldn’t do this. If our children turned out to love Jesus and follow Him it wasn’t going to be through my power. That afternoon I just gave it all over to God. I realized that He loved my children (the one born, the one in my womb and the ones still to come) far more than I ever would and I trusted that He would work in their lives and He has! God has sent so many other Christians to pour into my childrens lives in powerful ways. I am so incredibly blessed to say that I have 4 children (ages 16 to 23) who love and serve Jesus Christ. God deserves all the praise!

 Shortly after Jonathan was born in August of 2001 at Ken’s suggestion we moved to Minnesota so that we could be near my family. I am so grateful for that. There for many years we lived the American dream - 2 more little ones (Aaron and Megan) were added to our family so we had 2 boys and 2 girls. Ken very successfully ran his own business and I was blessed to homeschool our children, and be very involved at church and in our community. Our marriage wasn’t perfect but through God’s grace we had a happy home and we had good times together even though we didn’t have the same focus in life or the same foundation. One year when I was really struggling with loving Ken the way I should I started spending time each day writing down reasons I was thankful for him. That helped so much with my outlook. There is a reason that God tells us to give thanks in all circumstances.

In 2020 Ken decided that he wanted to sell his business (he had been thinking about it for a couple of years as it was sometimes stressful and very consuming). He decided at that time that selling his business wasn’t the only change he wanted. He started rethinking all of life and decided that since we didn’t have a great marriage (since we had different foundations for life) that he didn’t think he wanted to be married to me at all. There were quite a few months that fall that seemed like life was completely in limbo as we tried marriage counseling and I prayed like crazy for God to heal our marriage. I have never ever realized before this time just how wonderful it was to be part of the body of Christ. The local congregation was incredibly supportive in praying with us  and for us and reaching out to us in so many ways. The same was true of the church worldwide. At this time I started meeting with a couple of different women-individually- to pray every week and we still do that now. We have found it very valuable.  I highly recommend finding some trusted Christian friends to share with, confess your sins to and pray with regularly. People all over this country and beyond (and many that I didn’t even know) were praying for us, sending me notes of encouragement, spending time in fasting along with prayer. And then later after Ken left people even blessed us financially (anonymously and otherwise).  And though those days were hard, God was so very near. The prayers of the saints were heard. They weren’t answered in quite the way I hoped as Ken did decide to go through with divorce (God doesn’t force people to do what is right- we each have free will) but God gave the kids and I overwhelming love and support as we went through this time. I remember well the night in December that Ken told me for sure that he was going to go through with Divorce. He had already moved down to the basement the month before so that night I went up to my lonely bed and I just poured my heart out to God. I was able to go to sleep pretty easily that night but I did wake up many times throughout the night - each time I woke I just felt the overwhelming presence and love of God. He has been so near ever since. I have learned to truly pray through my day. I wake up praying, asking Him to work in me through His Spirit that day and I go to bed praying. Though I would have never chosen to go through this journey willingly I am so thankful that I did. I am thankful for the ways that God has helped me to grow.   

  

  In July of 2021 most of my kids and I went with a group from church out to Nationwide Youth Roundup for the first time. It was a really neat experience for all of us to be with that large of a group praising God and growing in our relationship with Him up on the mountainside. The theme song that year was “The Goodness of God”. I love that song and I completely agreed with the message of it intellectually but at that time I was struggling a bit with believing it in my heart. As I sang it over and over again that week the tears flowed every single time. But saying those words out loud over and over really helped the message get to my heart. I had struggled with the fact that even though I sought God’s guidance as whether to marry Ken or not, He had not stopped me, even though He knew the future. But as I considered it more I realized that had I not married Ken I wouldn’t have had the kids I do and my whole story and how God has worked in me and through me would be different. Even though there have been some rough patches, those are what have brought me the closest to God. God is able to work in my brokenness. He is truly good!

  One of the things I had really struggled with worrying about after Ken left was finances. Ken had always been the main income source in our home while I homeschooled our children. I did teach some music lessons through the years and I had a small home business doing wedding flowers but those did not make nearly enough to provide for our needs. Ken did start paying child support and alimony but that was still a lot less then we were used to and wouldn’t be coming for that long. I did get a part-time job at a local florist shop and God was at work in that too! - the timing of how things worked out and the prayers answered for both my boss and I. The divorce was final in September of 2021.

The year following that seemed in many ways a year of growing and testing for me in the area of trusting God. That year the hard drive on my computer crashed and much data was not retrievable. This was very challenging for my wedding flower business as all my quotes were on there and they hadn’t been properly backing up. This was overwhelming to me on so many levels as it struck me financially, it required a lot of my time (which seemed very limited right then) and it left me dealing with tech stuff which had always been Ken’s area of expertise - not mine at all! Also that year my washer quit and I had to replace it, my stove had a fire in it (and I thought I needed to replace it - thankfully I didn’t), In November I fell when out biking on slippery roads (not a good idea - I know) and I tore up some stuff in my shoulder and was in pain and fairly restricted for 6 weeks. That fall also brought some septic system issues (the pump went out) which continued on throughout the winter (it froze) and into the spring (the pipe had busted and now needed to be replaced) to the tune of over $6000. There were some times of major overwhelm and tears but I am thankful for the people who would hug me and pray with me and over and over again things would get fixed and it would all work out. By the time the Spring septic problem happened I was getting a little more used to the idea that God truly was taking care of us and providing for us and so when the plumber called to warn me that the new bill was going to be in the thousands I just said okay and realized that it was going to be fine. The cool thing was the timing of that because that evening when I went home from work I had an e-mail from my tax preparer saying that I was getting a much bigger return (a lot more than the plumbing bill) on my taxes than I had anticipated.  There were challenges that year but also in 2021 and 2022 I had the best years ever for Abbi’s Bridal Design (which I started in 2007), My boss gave me a 43% raise when I asked her, and people kept asking and asking if I had room for more music students. Also we were able to start an AirBnB in our basement which has worked out great. I have never had a fuller schedule but it is all stuff I enjoy and I am so thankful for the work that God has blessed me with. So even with all those trials a year after the divorce our bank account was better off than it had been before. God had and continues to amply provide. He is so good and we can always trust Him! He is faithful!! Life is truly beautiful when we walk with Him.