No Name
June 16, 2008 | stories
Today’s post is from one of my favorite people and most respected writer. Cec Murphey shares a story about his wife, Shirley, and a little girl with no name.
I don’t hear the term, “A mother in Israel” used often these days. It appears only a couple of times in the Old Testament. When I was fairly young in the faith, I used to hear the term regularly.
They referred to a woman, who might be a birth mother, but she was a person who wrapped her arms around others and expressed nurturing, motherly love.
I want to tell you about a mother in Israel. The story goes back to our days in Kenya. After we had been there at least a year and my wife had learned the Luo language, she went to a women’s convention with Africans Margaret and Wilfrida.
After they arrived at Kadem in our VW Bug, Shirley saw a little girl sitting alone next to the outside, wooden fire. Shirley guessed she was maybe eight years old. Her matted hair, dirty skin, and a dress that defied naming the color stirred up deep compassion in Shirley. She held out her hand to the child and introduced herself. (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
8:06 am |
Karon’s Story
May 14, 2008 | stories
Thank you for sharing your story. I wept when I read it. I found it by reading the interview on CBN — thank you for really good answers that were indepth and tangible - not just broad generics. This is a poem that I wrote -and of all the things that I struggle with, the one that’s the hardest and means the most is for me to be a better mom.
One Woman
by Karol Hansen
A girl so young
Her memory yet unformed
Suffered under abusing hands
(more…)
Posted by Suzie @
4:41 pm |
Amanda’s Story
My Story
by Amanda Grogan
Newlywed, Believer, Chi Alpha Ministries: NSU University
Today has been one of those days where I have done a lot of talking to my father in heaven in addition to those around me.
I am a firm believer that absolutely nothing happens in God’s world by mistake. So why is that every time something happens, the human part of me stops to think why is this happening?
Eventually, I realize that things occur because nothing happens in God’s world by mistake. So where am I going with this? Well, I believe that many years ago, my heavenly father began to write a story on the tablet of my heart. Throughout the course of my life, I have faced many obstacles. Some worse than others, some self-imposed, and some well…who knows but regardless, these obstacles have become a huge part of the woman I have become today.
Maybe it started when was a child and lived in a really disfunctional family that finally resulted in my parent’s divorce, losing loved ones in my life to death and/or distance, or maybe just the trials of everyday life, but I believe that the never-ending theme throughout my story is the idea of overcoming.
(more…)
Posted by Suzie @
4:37 am |
Gloria’s Story - II
Gloria’s story continues from yesterday. If you would like to share your story, send an e-mail to Suzie.
Gloria’s story - Part II
After trying so hard to be good and trouble free for my mother I rebelled after I graduated from high school.
I had enlisted in the United States Air Force and was due to go in November. I had a few months to kill. I got a summer job and ‘met a guy’.
How quickly I forgot about my ambitions in life. When it was time for me to go into boot camp for the Air Force I was ready to make a hasty decision to marry this man. (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
6:32 am |
Gloria’s Story
I was born on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. I was born the second of twin girls. My parents were both full blood Sioux Indians. My father was from the Oglala Sioux Nation and my mother a Rosebud Sioux.
Up in those parts even though each is a band of the Sioux Tribe, some of the people don’t get along. So my parents relationship was like that of the Montague and Capulet’s in Shakespear’s Romeo and Juliet. None of the women in my father’s family could tolerate my fathers love for my mother. Not only was she beautiful; she was a ‘Rosebud’.
And to my mother’s parents my father was never good enough for her. Much of that had to do with the fact that my mother’s father was a minister. And my father came from a family that was known for their ferocity and willingness to fight… (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
6:32 pm |
Interview: Pastor Rudy, Touch! II
Today we continue the interview with Pastor Rudy, author of Touch, pastor of St. Johns, and advocate for faith that intersects with a real world.
Suzie: Your father later came to your church and his life was changed. What would you say to teens or adults who live out their faith, but whose parents don’t agree with their new life?
Pastor Rudy: My dad taught me to “never trust preachers and church people.” He would go to say that they were all full of S_ _ _.
He was a graphic communicator with a very well placed esteem and courage to speak his own truth as if the world bowed to it. When I first began my dad told his friends that he had “lost me to God” as if he was in competition to keep me from getting to God, but what he really meant was in the cryptic code. (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
5:10 am |
Interview: Pastor Rudy, Touch!
The Pastor Rudy Experience
Pastor Rudy’s blog
Today & tomorrow’s interview is with a pastor making a difference in the toughest streets of Houston, TX. He is the author of Touch: Pressing Against the Wounds of a Broken World . He has joined with Beyonce in a global anti-hunger initiative. He found God while working with his father in what he calls a borderline bordello. I hope you enjoy the interview with Pastor Rudy.
Suzie: I want to thank you for joining us on Dare to Believe. I read your book, Touch. When you became a believer, you were running a different type of business with your father. What did God show you in the midst of that environment?
Pastor Rudy: There were many lessons learned in our little “Borderline Bordello.” (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
11:08 am |
A Real Father
February 20, 2008 | stories
I love it when visitors to this blog send me their stories. I’m a collector of stories. Some people collect Precious Moments or antiques, but I am always on the lookout for a story of relevant faith. I work with teens, and a growing number of girls struggle with father issues, as do women of all ages. I never knew my biological father, though I met him once or twice, so I get that. But I’m grateful for a heavenly Father, one I can sense, feel, trust, and know. That’s the heart of today’s story–from a reader who discovered what a Father could be. . .
I am a child of divorce. My mother married an abusive man, then left him when I was four. I never saw him again. (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
3:37 am |
Tiffany’s Story
Today I interview Tiffany Stuart. She talks about looking for love, an abortion she didn’t want, but had, and how God helped change this painful chapter in the story of her life.
Suzie: When you were in your early twenties, you said you abandoned your faith for a time. That’s interesting because there is a study out that says that 86% of twentysomethings leave their faith. What happened in your case?
Tiffany: My relationship with God grew stale in high school. I moved during my 9th grade summer to the desert away from my city and friends. My new friends weren’t believers, or if they were, I didn’t know it. So I had no accountability. No one asked me to youth group anymore. I didn’t really understand what I read in the Bible, and my family didn’t attend church.
So in my early twenties, I worked two jobs and started hanging out with my friends at nightclubs. Going to church after I partied on Saturday night just didn’t seem right. I didn’t want to be a hypocrite. I was either in or out. Out seemed like more fun.
Back then, my view of God was warped. I viewed Him as a punishing God if I didn’t do all the right things. I wasn’t exactly walking the holy road during those days. Who wants to run to an angry God who might say, “Shame on you”? Not me. So I walked away from my faith.
Suzie: What would you say to the twentysomething that is disillusioned with faith? Where do they turn when they have doubts or feel like they’ve failed? (more…)
Posted by Suzie @
2:31 pm |
Happy Birthday, Mom, from a reader named Marla
January 21, 2008 | stories
Yesterday my sister and her family, my brother and his family, and I sat in church with my mom. She turned 70 on January 20th and one of the birthday surprises was to show up at her church.
She cried all the way through service, and they were good tears.
The pastor prayed a dismissal prayer, and my parents were out of there as if shot out of a cannon. I smiled, looking around at my parent’s social adult kids and grandchildren ready to shake hands and meet people, while mom and dad stood by the door of their home church, poised to fly out the door.
We are so different, my parents and I, but I digress. . .
As I watched my mom’s happiness yesterday, I couldn’t help but also think about her pain. There were a lot of years that she felt lost.
(more…)
Posted by Suzie @
2:56 pm |
