08/30/2013
"The Incredible Power of Words"
- Sarah Adams
As I walked through the front door and tossed my school books on the table, I heard my mom say my name. Normally, I would have headed straight to my room to avoid her drunken tirades, but my curiosity got the best of me, and I crept quietly down the hall towards the kitchen to better eavesdrop on this conversation. Mom's back was turned to me, but I could tell by her slurred speech and her unsteady swaying that she'd been drinking most of the afternoon.
That didn't surprise me. What totally shocked me were the words I heard coming out of my mothers mouth. Using terms that would make a sailor blush, my mom ranted and raved into the phone, describing my immoral lifestyle.
Too stunned to even cry, I ran to my room.
Is that really what my own mother thinks of me? .........
Even though some of my friends had begun experimenting with s*x and drugs, I still held fast to the moral standard I'd been raised with--saving myself until marriage. I didn't have a personal relationship with God, but I did have a conscience. Morals mattered to me.
What my mom thought mattered, too, and the wounds from her words went deep. It was hard enough being a "good kid" in a home where alcohol often turned my parents into irrational strangers. But to have my mom think--and speak--such terrible lies about me.... In my pain and confusion, I grimly determined to live up to her expectations.
Opportunities to fulfill her bleak prophecies came easily. Drugs dulled my conscience along with my aching heart. Soon, I surpassed all my friends in their rebellious lifestyles. Because of their own alcohol addiction, my parents never even noticed my shift decline...until the day I didn't come home..............
"Go home, child."
At first, I thought it was the cold that had awakened me. I lay shivering under my thin shawl on the bare mattress, trying to pull my thoughts together. Then I heard it again, clearly, only not with my ears. I heard with my heart.
"Go home, Sarah."
I instinctively sensed that God was speaking to me, but vaguely wondered why He would tell me to go to the last place on earth I wanted to be. The cold forces me to get up and move, and that's when I first noticed that I was alone. The usual sprawl of unconscious bodies was missing, and as I stumbled about the filthy apartment, I realized that so were my stash, my drug money, and even my clothes. While I'd been sleeping off my last fix, my "friends" had taken everything I owned and taken off.
Minutes later, I found myself standing in the rain, thumb out, hitching a ride towards home. I had nowhere else to go. Anxiety grew in my heart as each ride brought me closer to the explosive environment I'd escaped. All too quickly, I found myself dropped off at a gas station only miles from my house.
"Oh God, I don't want to go home--help me!"
Only silence answered my prayer. Despondent, I waited in the gray drizzle for the next car to stop. Soaked and shivering, I climbed into the Volkswagen bug that slowed and stopped a few yards past me. The driver was a young man with curly black hair and the kindest blue eyes I'd ever seen. He drove me home that day, but more than that--he pointed me towards heaven.
Before he took me home, he bought me lunch. After devouring the first real food I'd had in days, I found myself pouring out my heart to this total stranger, telling him why I'd run away and why I was even more afraid to go home. He listened quietly until I'd finished talking, then looked directly at me with his piercing eyes.
"Sarah," he said gently, "you are so precious to God. I've just met you, but I can sense your sweet spirit."
Before I could protest, he continued, "God has wonderful plans and a special purpose for your life, and as strange as this may sound, I believe the road to this new life begins by going home."
"Go home, Sarah."
The words from earlier that day came echoing back to my heart. I felt an unexplainable peace--an assurance that everything would work out all right. Even though I had no idea how.
My friend took me home that day, and I found my parents in worse shape than when I'd left. But God had a plan for me, and I moved in with Christian relatives the following week. My aunt and uncle not only provided a stable home life for me, they took me to their little country church each Sunday. There I sat, week after week, listening to the amazing truth of God's love for me.
The words the young man had spoken to me began to bear fruit. I longed for a relationship with my loving Heavenly Father, and wanted to know His plans and purposes for me. One Sunday, I found myself walking down the aisle and left the church a new creature in Christ. I'll never forget how I felt that day--every sin had been washes away! I was pure--I was clean. Forgiven for all I'd done.
And I'll never forget that young man who obeyed the Holy Spirit's prompting and offered hope to me.
Thank you for the ride. And for speaking words of life. -Sarah
