WHAT DO I DO WITH JESUS…conclusion

I have totally changed what I was going to conclude for you today.  I had three amazing points as to what to do with Jesus. But as I tried to write them out, something was tugging at my heart to just share with you my story of Jesus. Maybe my story will help your story.

So, no three-point sermon today…just me and Jesus.

What would I say to the man in the parking lot that day on the 4^th of July?

The man I saw that day was tattered and worn.  His skin was darker than mine. His clothes were dirtier than mine. He was not sitting on the porch of an Airbnb enjoying the morning, but he was waking up to the left over drunk from the night before.  Our paths would never meet, but if they did, this is what I would want to tell Him about my Jesus.

My Jesus is my hope.

              He is my survival.

                             He is my anchor.

                                           He is my lifeline!

“Sir…I can’t tell you that you need Jesus unless I tell you what to do with Him.  Can I tell you my story?

I grew up in the Midwest state of Missouri.  Our streets were lined with beautiful trees and manicured lawns.  I had plenty of food on my table and clean clothes to wear. I was educated at a good school and went to church every Sunday morning in my best dress. We were the all-white, all American family.

But I lived a life of façade. I was the daughter of a pastor, but a child of abuse.  Within my home, I was taught the rules of following Jesus and I worked hard to follow those rules. Jesus was taught to me as a rule book and His grace was based on my good behavior.  The interesting thing is that I behaved well. I kept the rules and even pushed the rules off on others. I have lived in the Christian culture all my life judging from the pinnacle on which I sat. I took that ability to judge others into my adult life and surrounded myself with others like me within my Christian culture. Until one day, my marriage broke. I was now a pastor’s wife but was living within the same façade in which I was raised. Broken on the inside, yet perfect on the outside.

At one point in my healing, in realized that the reason I judged others so strongly was because I couldn’t chance getting close to them. If I ever let down my façade of judgement, others would have found the real me and that couldn’t happen.  They would have seen my broken marriage and my broken spirit.

Growing up as a pastor’s daughter was even more fake than being a pastor’s wife, which is hard to believe. Every Sunday morning, we would put on our Sunday dresses (I had an older sister) and the yelling and the screaming would take place all the way to the church parking lot. Once we stepped out of our car, we would straighten out the wrinkles in our dresses and plaster the smiles on our faces. 

But there was much more that went on in our pastor’s home other than the yelling and the screaming.  I would watch my father relentlessly shame my mother for being overweight and overeating (my mother is truly one of the most beautiful women that I know!). I would watch my mother cower to his control.

Nighttime was the hardest time for me. I would wake up in fear as my father screamed at my sister and afraid that he was hitting her. My nights were dark!

Around the age of 11, I experienced for the first time my father looking at my body with lust. As a young girl, I was not aware of the sexual journey what would be ahead of me with my father.

As I lived in constant fear from the sexual, physical, and emotional abuse, I worked hard every day to behave as best I could to avoid as much abuse as possible.  But none of it worked. The sexual improprieties continued, the strikes to my face continued and the feelings of worthlessness haunted my soul. How could the man in my life who was to protect and love me destroy my soul?

But somewhere amid the chaos, I found Jesus.  I’m not exactly sure how that happened other than the church telling me that I needed Him, but I found Him…truly found Him. Jesus became my rock and my foundation as a young girl. I am not telling you this because of my church surroundings, please know that.  I am telling you this because I believe to the depths of my being, Jesus was my survival. I clung onto to Him in moments when I was drowning in my hopelessness.

The Jesus that was taught to me by my father was not the Jesus of my salvation. Jesus was my lifeline…He was my survival…He was the only hope that I had.

At night, as a young child, I would lay in my bed trembling that my father would enter the room. As I would lay there, I would stare at my bedroom window planning my escape. As an adult, I see those moments as though Jesus was standing at that window waiting to provide me the comfort and safety that I needed.

“Mister, that’s why I need Jesus. I need Him as salvation for my soul. He is my hope amid hopelessness.  Someday I am going to meet Jesus face to face, and we are going to have a conversation.  We won’t talk about the rules that I did or did not follow. We will talk about the nights when I thought that my life was over no longer desiring to live and how He gave me just enough hope to hold on.

Sir…I am grateful that I am alive today to tell you about my Jesus.  He can be yours too!”

A few years ago, I was at work talking to one of my young college co-workers. Her and I talked around the world of moral issues.  We talked about homosexuality, abortion, politics…all the biggies.  There is no doubt that her and I saw these issues from different perspectives. But no where in the conversation was it either of ours intent to convince the other to cross sides.  I respected her for her beliefs, and she respected me for mine. It is one of the most memorable conversations with a girl that I love deeply.  From previous conversations, this sweet girl knew some of my story of abuse amongst religious piety. At the end of this conversation (which took place during most of our 8-hour shift), she looked at me and said,

“Momma Mel (that’s what the kids called me),

if I ever believe in God it will be because of your story.”

Tears filled my soul because I knew in that exact moment that I had found what I needed to do with Jesus!