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GOD ON THE MOVE IN MY LIFE

By Mary Jane Sears

A word from the Lord

Thus saith the Lord: “ I am the Lord thy God;

Thou shalt not bow down to circumstances as

though they were leading you, rather than I, myself. ”

Dedication

This book is dedicated to the Lord who does all things well

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

         I sincerely acknowledge gratitude and appreciation and love to my husband, Arthur, and our children; John, Theresa, Patricia, Michael, Kevin, and Keith, and my special appreciation to my daughters-in-law, Janet, Mary, and Susan, and my sons-in-law, Robert and Fred for being a part of my life.

         A special thank you to my husband for surprising me with an electric typewriter, and in the course of time a computer, which he gave me for the express purpose of finishing this book.

         I want to express my deepest appreciation to my natural and spiritual family who encouraged and supported me as I groped along. Words can’t express my heartfelt thanks to Bonnie for the hours she spent reading, correcting and typing the first four chapters from my confusing hand written notes. I’m amazed she was able to do it when I myself had trouble reading my own notes.

         Also a special note of thanks to Bonnie’s husband for the use of his typewriter so long ago. Little did we know then that the Lord would give Bonnie and Randy Dreckmann their own printing business and then continue to use their faithful help and support to print this book. The Lord finishes what He begins.

         At just the most opportune time the Lord teamed Sheila Vitale, Cecilia and Norris Bryant and Rita Satterfield to illustrate our lovely book cover for which I am very grateful.

CONTENTS 

     1 Childhood Memories ................................. 1

   11 The Lord’s Drawing ................................. 23

 111 A New Creature in Christ -

          Born Again .............................................. 31

   1V The Spirit of God Is Given To Those

           Who Obey .............................................. 37

     V Walking It Out By Faith .............................45

    V1 Experiences Along The Way ........... ..... 55

  V11 His Healing Touch In Personal

            Relationships ........................................ 79

 V111 You Haven’t Seen Anything Yet .......... 105

CHAPTER 1

CHILDHOOD MEMORIES

         My childhood saw many happy moments, but the bad times hung like such a cloud of doom over the whole family, that I would never want to experience it again.

         Our family consisted of my father, mother, two brothers and myself. But when I was about four years old, my father’s mother moved into our four room second floor apartment which looked out over our busy neighborhood.

We were very crowded by today’s standards, but never thought anything of it. We loved to look out of the window on a rainy day and watch the people hurry along or jump on and off the trolley cars below. Across the street, there was a candy store, a delicatessen, and Muldowney’s Bar. Watching the antics of the drunks would amuse us. They were so funny, when it wasn’t “hitting home.” Muldowney’s and the Irish songs on the accordions and harmonica which drifted up to our apartment entertained us many a night. In my mother’s own words, “Your father and I should never have been married.” He was outgoing, the life of the party and always in style. She, on the other hand, was timid, reserved (she used hardly any makeup) and preferred a movie to father’s parties. She had been a “tom-boy” as a young girl, and after she married my father, continued to hate the housework which she always considered a distasteful chore. “You three children were the only good that came out of our marriage”, she told us later on.

         My early years were laced with anxiety which manifested in thumb sucking, nail biting, hair twisting, and bed wetting until the late age of thirteen. My mother, God bless her, was very tolerant. I idolized my father as a little girl, and particularly loved the times when he danced with me on his stocking feet as he counted “one step, two step” to the rhythm of the music playing on the radio. I would fill his pipe with the sweet smelling Half and Half tobacco he loved and sometimes, I would even light his cigar. He would put the cigar band on my ring finger and call me his “little princess.” When we walked down the street together, he would squeeze my hand three times and tell me, that means “I love you”. I was so proud of him with his handsome face, blue eyes and quick smiling grin. He looked just like a sophisticated executive in his light grey suit, highly polished shoes, and perfectly tipped hat. He was never at a loss for words (even big words I could not understand), and his favorite topics were politics, the law, and great boxers like Joe Louis.

         My dreams were shattered when my father began to drink heavily and soon severe mood changes were not uncommon. Shortly thereafter my grandfather died and my father’s mother who suffered from progressive crippling arthritis, came to live with us. Her infirmity never did prevent her from making bathtub gin or from selling what she and my father did not drink themselves. They drank together often and frequently got into loud arguments. Grandma and I liked to play old time Irish records on a wind-up phonograph.

         My mother worked in a factory during the day and Grandma, (who could not do any physical work) painstakingly taught me how to make a bed, wash the dishes, and sweep the floor. I learned what a privilege it is to work, and loved the sense of accomplishment which comes with hard work and the feeling of being “grown up” which accompanied a job “well done.” Every time Grandma rewarded me with two pennies, I ran up to the candy store to buy two, one-cent kit candy packs with four caramels in each. One was for me and the other one for my three year old brother, Huey. My older brother, Frank, had recently started school, but had trouble learning and was labeled “slow.”

         Daddy’s behavior grew progressively violent and it became a common practice for Grandma to put his work gun under the cushion of her rocking chair at the first opportunity. Then, when he finally found it, he would wave it in the air and threaten to kill us. When we told him what he did the next day, he would deny everything. My grandmother urged my mother to slip out of the house at night. She would go to a movie and return only after my grandmother signaled her by lowering the window shade, indicating that it was safe to come home. My father would fall asleep once my mother left and the children were in bed, and one more battle was avoided. Daddy fought with Grandma too, and on several occasions he knocked her glasses right off her face. Finally, the day came when she told him, “You are no son of mine.”

         World War 11 broke out, and the Navy drafted my father. He did not want to go to war and forced my mother to try to get letters from the parish priest, the Red Cross, and our family doctor saying that he was needed at home. Every attempt to avoid the draft failed so my father went overseas. My Grandma Williams died while he was away.

         My grandmother’s death was traumatic for me and my brothers, largely because no one told us she had died. Relatives returning from the wake slept in our living room chairs. I remember, vaguely, their tear filled eyes and pleading with one of my father’s cousins to tell me where my grandmother was. She spoke tenderly to me, but gave me no information. It was frightening to know something is wrong but not what that something is. Finally, when I found out Grandma had died, I was very angry that I had not been permitted to share my grief with the rest of the family. At my insistence, my mother kept the door to my grandmother’s room closed and if it were opened even for a moment, I froze with fear and panic. One morning, I gathered up all the courage that I could muster and climbed on top of the radiator outside of Grandma’s room, opened the door and walked in. After walking around inside, the fear left me. It was this experience that would set the stage for me to face any fears that came my way and to deal with them.

         When my Grandma Soderlund died, it was very different. We faced it as a family, so it was natural and comforting.

         We spent two beautiful and peaceful years with my mother when my father was in the service. She was a carpenter’s daughter and had learned many of his skills. Mama could fix broken windows and build scooters and roller skating boards. We joyfully raced our bicycles up and down the block. I especially liked to play “kick the can and run” and watch my mother cheer us on. Mama even played stickball with my brothers and the other kids on the block. Some I’m still in contact with; Joanne (the nurse who was there for my daughter when she was burnt); Loretta and Jerry (who met when they were in our wedding party and later married); and Kathleen (who would spend some summer weeks with us when our children were small). To this day we spend a week away together for our yearly reunion.

         When my father came home from the Navy, I didn’t even recognize him. He was sporting a new moustache (it tickled when he kissed me). I was happy when he shaved it off. He brought me a pair of castanets and an idol. The idol was a black African tribesman about a foot high, with eyes and a mouth made of ivory. I liked to wrap it up in my father’s handkerchiefs like a doll. Each night I would place it high on the shelf under the ceiling that went around the living room so that my brothers couldn’t break it. (No way could I have imagined then that I would one day be part of a missionary team to the continent of Africa that the idol represented).

         At first it was nice having my father home until he started drinking again. He would curse and accuse my mother of all sorts of things when he was drunk, including the death of my grandmother. My father would force my mother to drink with him when she didn’t want to (because of guilt feelings). On one occasion he forced a bottle of whiskey down her throat. She choked and gasped for air. It was about this time that I became keeper of his gun and slept with it under my pillow. The next day, when I would ask him why he did these things he would deny doing them, even when my mother bore obvious bruises and black eyes. He would actually tell me things like “your mother walked into a wall.” On other occasions he would open the windows facing the courtyard of the adjoining buildings and yell and curse at the neighbors. The next day, I would be so humiliated that I couldn’t even talk to the neighbors I met in the hallway or on the steps leading into our building. Shame cloaked me. Years later, the Lord was to give me an inner healing from these memories.

         My father was interested in politics and had many friends who were politicians. He and my mother were invited to many political parties, but my mother steadfastly refused to go because she didn’t know how to act around “those people.” Sometimes he would take me to the afternoon gatherings (dressed in my beautiful Persian Lamb collar coat with matching hat and muff) and show me off. One time we even watched the St. Patrick’s Day Parade with the mayor in his personal reviewing stand.

         On the lighter side, I remember going to the movies on Saturday mornings with my brothers and their friends. Admission was eleven cents, but once in a while there was a special price of nine cents. The continuing Superman serial, the cartoon and the Tarzan movies were my favorites. The admission price steadily rose to sixteen cents, then twenty-one cents and finally to twenty-five cents. We thought that was a lot of money. My brothers and I would collect all the soda and beer bottles we could find. Then we would return them and collect the deposit money. Sometimes we had to wash the bottles out because roaches were stuck in the bottom. The man at the store wouldn’t take them that way. We usually collected enough money to pay for the movie and to buy some candy also. When the movie was over, my brothers would run on ahead of me. I would lose all sense of direction coming out of the dark theater and many times I had to ask a policeman to walk me home (even though my house was only ten blocks away). I would become so confused, I would just stand there and cry. My brothers never understood that I really didn’t know how to get home by myself. Unaware that these experiences were the symptoms of epilepsy operating against me in my daily life, I determined to exert twice the effort as other kids to keep up with them (particularly in school work).

         Babies thrilled me and I loved to babysit for our neighbor’s children. Veronica (now a close friend) was my favorite baby. I would dress her, polish her white shoes, place her in her carriage and walk her all over the neighborhood. I even took my confirmation name after her.

            There wasn’t a time I didn’t enjoy playing house. I owned a beautiful miniature high coach carriage and pretty blanket and pillow set to go with it. Of course, there was also my “Shirley Temple” doll and a well played with “Betsy-Wetsy” doll.

         One day, my mother and I were returning beer bottles to the store and my little carriage was piled high with them. We started to cross a main street in our neighborhood and as I pushed my carriage across the trolley tracks, it collapsed under the weight. This tragic childhood loss was a vivid reality to me for many years.

         At Christmas time, my mother was just as excited as we were. She took us to the stores and we would pick out the things we liked. She never told us “Santa Claus” stories and we liked it that way. We just believed it was Jesus’ birthday. Nuns and priests were highly esteemed in the Catholic School that I attended. They told us (and we believed) that filling

miter boxes with coins was our birthday present to Jesus.

         Eventually I lost all interest in holidays and birthdays. They would always end in a fight no matter how nice the day started off.

         My father added horse playing and gambling to his list of activities. One day he put money on a horse named “Contrary Mary” (because of me). He won a lot of money. Joe, the “milkman” (my father’s bookie) hung out on a corner near the department stores. When I walked to the stores with my friends, he would ask me to remind my father about the money he owed him.

         When bill collectors knocked on our door (which was often), I would tell them that my father wasn’t home, at his request. No one was allowed in the house because, by this time, all the violence going on inside was obvious. There were broken windows on our French-type panel glass doors, holes in the walls, and general decay everywhere.

         One of my “favorite” jobs was cleaning my father’s spittoon. He would put a little water in it, add his cigar stubs and then spit phlegm into it all night. Later on, in a drunken rage, he would throw it up against the living room wall and the “contents” would splatter everywhere. What a great preparation for messy diapers and other distasteful chores involved in the care of others that was.

         My mother would send me shopping at the delicatessen. “Charging the food to our bill” was another source of embarrassment for me. I would wait until all the customers left before I went into the store. Sometimes it was a long wait. I was glad when the grocer wouldn’t let us charge beer or cigarettes anymore. To this day, I don’t like to use credit (even a credit card unless necessary).

         Another one of my chores was to empty the water pan under our ice box. As soon as school let out at three o’clock, I would promptly run home to do it. If I were late the water would overflow and begin to drip onto the barber’s ceiling whose shop was located underneath our apartment. Then the barber would come upstairs, bang on our door (and in broken English with a very heavy Italian accent) would yell and complain about losing customers because water was dripping on them. What an experience! It’s probably responsible for my aversion to being late or unprepared for occasions.

         Returning home from school to an empty house was always a source of gloom, particularly in the winter months. When something special had occurred or I did well on a test, I would be all excited and would wish my mother were there to share it with me. By the time she got home from work, all my enthusiasm had evaporated. I would ponder to myself, “if ever I have kids, I’m going to make sure I’m home when they get there.”

         There was yet another time that a deep impression was left on me. My mother would keep grocery money in the teapot in our kitchen closet from time to time. One summer day, when I was about 8 or 9 years old, I climbed up and took a ten dollar bill out. Going downstairs, I invited all the kids in the neighborhood for ice cream. I knew I was wrong to take it but I didn’t think it was “that wrong.” The change from the ten dollars was promptly returned to the teapot. When my mother returned from work, she went to the tea pot and asked me where the money was. I didn’t hesitate to tell her that I took it. Then she looked at me sadly and said in a crushingly disappointed tone, “Oh Mary.” I was devastated and felt deep shame. She didn’t holler at me or scold or punish me, but from that moment on I couldn’t even so much as take a pencil that didn’t belong to me.

         My father was working for the Customs Department at that time, and I would faithfully wait at the subway station for him at 5 P.M. Studying the faces of the people coming down from the elevated platform, I would search for him. My heart would skip for gladness when I saw him. It meant there wasn’t going to be another violent night in the house. I had it all figured out that he wouldn’t stop off at the bar if I were there to walk home with him. Sometimes he would stop at the ice cream parlor and buy me a cone. However, it wasn’t long before my coaxing and tugging was to no avail. He would be determined to go into the bar for just “one drink.” I’d stay with him until I knew it was no use. Then I would go home and prepare everyone for the worse.

         Food was provided by my mother’s factory job, while my father’s pay went for alcohol and gambling debts. Our rent was usually late and our electricity was shut off time and time again. At these times my brothers and I would play ghost games with sheets over our heads. We would do our homework and even read comic books via candlelight or with a flashlight. Nothing was a hardship for us, except our parents fighting.

         It was a rule in our house to be home as soon as it got dark out. In the winter time we were sent to bed at 6 o’clock, because my father wanted quiet. We all jumped at his every word, including my mother. She would put the radio on for us and we would listen to all our favorite programs. On Sunday night, there were the stories of Jesus on “The Greatest Story Ever Told.” I used to love to read stories about the saints and the heroic things they did. We also read a lot of comic books and played checkers. My brother, Huey, and I would take turns with our furry cat, Roseanne, to keep our feet warm on winter nights. It was alright in the winter time going to bed so early, but in the summer time we would cry, listening to our friends playing outside through the open windows. When my father was drinking more heavily , it didn’t even matter to him if we had supper or not before he sent us to bed. Sometimes Momma would sneak food into us. She was drinking more now, too.

         The house key was always kept on a cord around my neck as a symbol of my responsibility around the house since the age of eight. Between ten and twelve years of age, I readily fell into all the household chores. Often, my father and mother would tell me I was doing a good job. At times, my mother would call me “her” mother, jokingly.

         I was a fairly quiet child and soon found myself studying the people around me and their life styles. During a two week summer stay with my aunt Vera and Uncle Artie in Carmel, New York, I marveled at the peace and orderliness in their lives. “Do people really live like this, treating each other with such tender kindness?” I pondered this considering that there wasn’t much of that life style in my neighborhood.

         Disappointments and broken promises left deep hurts in me. Rather than depend on anyone else, I began to make my own plans. I would travel to the zoo or to the Museum of Natural History on Sundays, after church, with my friends. We went all over the city by bus or subway. Seeing the skeleton of a dinosaur and other things at the museum laid the foundation for me to believe in evolution. It was a big stumbling block that the Lord would later explain to me as I began my search for truth.

         My father’s favorite phrase to us was always “Stop and think.” My brothers and I would mimic his words behind his back. There were times that I thought if I hear him say that one more time I’m going to scream! Nevertheless, I would often find myself stopping and thinking and evaluating circumstances and people around me.

         My parents began to drink with a red headed divorcee who had two daughters. They lived one block away from the East River in a run-down, rat infested, wooden apartment house, that had several abandoned apartments in it. The railing going downstairs was shaky and the floor creaked whenever anyone walked. They made me babysit one night, promising me that they would be home by 10 P.M. Naturally, 10 P.M. came and went, but they never showed up. You could hear the rats scratching through the walls and scurrying along on the floors. I was terrified. The girls began to bicker and my nerves were raw as I impatiently watched the clock slowly tick by. The older girl was pretty bold, like her mother, and was about seven or eight years old. The younger one was timid and about five years old. As they continued to bicker, I took the younger one over my knee and pulled down her pants, intending to slap her once or twice. Then suddenly, I was slapping her bottom over and over again, and worse still, there was a sense of sadistic pleasure that I was experiencing. Hating violence and realizing what was happening, I was appalled at myself. Running out of the building, I ran the block and a half to the bar I knew they were at. I shouted to my parents and the girls’ mother that I was going home and that I would never baby sit again. It was now close to midnight and that section was deserted and eerie. I ran from the bar and continued running until I was out of breath, constantly looking over my shoulder and listening for footsteps. I made it home in record time covering the mile long distance.

         The next day I couldn’t even talk to my parents. That incident troubled me for a long time. I questioned myself how I could behave in such a manner. Why I picked on the timid one, who I liked, rather than the sarcastic bold girl, disturbed me as well. Years later, the Lord would use this experience by recalling it to mind during a meeting on child abuse. It would bring out the need to have compassion on the parents who abuse their children and a plan to effectively minister to their emotional problems as a means of eliminating all further abuse. We’re all guilty of it in one subtle form or another. Because of our own frustrations and inadequacy, we use our sharp tongue to cut down a child or some person, leaving them emotionally scarred, which is just as damaging as physical abuse, if not more so. We all need God’s help.!

         My father began working as a prison guard at Sing Sing State Prison, about that time. He used to say that the prisoners had it so good, that soon they would be trying to break into prison instead of out of it. As the violent scenes progressed in our house, I began coming to the defense of my mother. I would watch my father’s handsome face twist and snarl into such ugly distortions. He would spit and scream out obscene remarks and foul language just spewed out of him. Much later on in life, I would come to the understanding that demons were operating in my father’s life and were responsible for the terror we experienced. In the process of attempting to come to the aid of my mother, I began getting hurt, too. In order to escape these scenes, my mother and I began to run off to the movies. Coming home at midnight, we would listen at our apartment door. If we heard him ranting, we would go up on the roof or the top floor of our apartment house to sleep. That was alright in the summer time, but in winter it would be so cold we would go down into the coal room to keep warm until daybreak. A few times we didn’t leave early enough and the superintendent would come down to stoke the furnace and find us there. How mortified I felt when this happened.

         When things would calm down for a week or so, my mother would tell my father that we had spent the night on the roof or in the hallway. I used to think to myself, “How can she be so stupid as to tell him the truth when he asked?” Sure enough, he would come looking for us on his next drunken rampage. We had to jump over the roof to an adjoining apartment house to escape him one time. I was so terrified that I thought my heart would stop. My mother felt the same way, too. Then came the all night subway and bus rides, where we would sleep on each other’s shoulders so that Mama could go to work and I could go to school the next day. How I hated the stares of people looking at us at 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning, wondering why we were out at that time of night. It was humiliating, but still it was better than facing the ordeal my father would put us through. My brothers would go to bed and have to listen to him rant half the night before he would fall asleep in his drunken stupor. It would go on for hours more and become violent if my mother stayed.

         One time, he came down the darkened movie aisle calling our names like a maniac. We were so frightened. We slid out of our seats and escaped through a side exit. From then on we would go to a movie out of our immediate neighborhood. Sometimes we would return a day or two later to see the same movie over again, just to have a place to pass the long hours away. Often it would take our last nickel to do it. With these childhood memories, I was never bored with everyday living in later years. It left me content when things were just peaceful. I would always muse to myself when other housewives complained about dull routines and housework chores.

         How my mother survived some of the beatings she went through was beyond me. I would ask her why she ever married my father and she would say that he wasn’t like that when he was younger. Vividly, I remember my father beating her and dragging her into the bathroom and flushing her head in the toilet repeatedly. When her head was lifted, it looked like blood was coming out of her eyes, nose and mouth all at once. Even after I was married, I would have nightmares of that scene. After that, hatred began to grow in me.

         That was the year I turned fourteen and major changes took place. For one thing, I was through running. Openly, I would oppose my father and tell him what I thought of him face to face. One night, after a particularly bloody battle, my father had gone to bed and something happened inside of me. For too long, fear of my father had overshadowed me and our family. I took our large kitchen knife and went into my father’s bedroom, fully intending to kill him. There was no question in my mind that it was wrong and that I would have to pay a price, and I was willing to do so. As I stood over his sleeping 6'1" frame, there wasn’t a trace of fear in me. My thoughts were that “He’ll never raise a hand to any of us again.” I tried to come down with that knife, but something held back my hand. Now I know it to be the hand of the Lord. With my free hand, I violently shook my father awake. He opened his eyes and panic was evident in his face as he saw me with the knife still held high in my hand. All I said to him in a venomous tone was “You have to sleep sometime.” With that I walked out of the room, never even considering if he would attack me from behind or retaliate in any way.

         After that, things were somewhat different in our house. My father would never attempt to hit my mother when I was around. Even when I wasn’t around, he would warn her not to tell me what he had said or done. Slowly, I began to take over the running of the house. A dominating spirit was being developed in me, but I wasn’t aware of it. I just did what had to be done. Working part-time after school, I earned $28.00 a week. From that, I paid our rent of $32 and the gas and electric bill, which was about $10 a month. We never had a car or a phone. It was a pleasure not to have anyone knocking on the door for money. My tuition at St. Alphonsus’ High School was $10 a month, and I always had pocket money and carfare to do what I had to do. In order to work at fourteen, I took my baptismal certificate and dipped it in bleach to erase the writing. Then I wrote over it to change the dates in order to get my working papers. I gave an older appearance and didn’t have any problems.

         My father had these Betty Grable calendar pinups on his wall. Compared to today’s pornography, it was pretty mild. Each time he would put one up, I would tear it down. No sooner would I get rid of one, and he would have another up. I would shout at him, “This is my house; I pay the rent and you are not going to have that trash in my house.” My persistence eventually paid off. Sometimes, I actually got the feeling that my father respected the control I exercised in the house.

         At the age of fourteen, I had my first epileptic seizure in my sleep. Then they began to happen while I was in school. There was such turmoil going on in my family, that I didn’t give it much thought, and I just began to take the medication the doctor’s prescribed. Still the seizures occurred, and I was determined not to let it interfere with my life in any way. It was considered just another sick day in my life that would pass, along with the migraine headache that each seizure would leave me with.

         That same year I met Artie, my future husband, at a neighborhood party. One night as we returned from a date, I heard my mother’s piercing scream upon entering the hallway of our apartment building. Fear gripped me as I ran upstairs, hollering at Artie to go home and not follow me up. He started to come up with me until he realized I wasn’t fooling. I never told him much, and I was too ashamed to let him walk into the scene I knew all too well was taking place. He reluctantly left that night, but there was no discouraging him as far as future dates were concerned. Meanwhile, thoughts I had entertained of becoming a nun quickly faded out. The following year in early December, Artie left for the Marines. Arriving home on his second leave, he came knocking at my door with an engagement ring and presented it to me at the very “romantic hour” of six o’clock in the morning. Artie was not quite eighteen years old and I was fifteen. To avoid making any explanations to the nuns at school, I wore the ring on a chain around my neck, tucked inside my school uniform. While leaning over at my desk, Sister St. Joseph came by and questioned me about the ring which was now hanging outside my uniform. I told her the truth and she surprised me by saying, “If a boy thought enough of you to give you an engagement ring, you should think enough of him to wear it.” From that day on I wore it all the time.

         The summer I was fifteen, I applied for a full time job at J.P. Stevens Linen Co. I told them I was eighteen and had graduated from high school. They hired me and I worked in their secretarial pool. I would always wear high heels, white gloves and eat lunch at the fancy restaurants with the other girls. Come September, they wouldn’t believe me when I told them how old I was and that I was quitting to go back to school.

         There came a particular night that my father continued all night with his ranting routine. It was a sleepless night for all of us and at 6 A.M. I went into the kitchen. I lit the stove to make a pot of coffee and proceeded to get dressed for school. As I came back into the kitchen, my father grabbed my wrist as I was lifting the coffee pot from the stove. I instinctively threw the boiling water at him, scalding his arm. He ran out into the street and brought back a policeman, demanding to have me arrested. My brothers and mother came to my defense. They showed the policeman scars on my hands and elbow where my father had gone after me with broken whiskey bottles in the past. The policeman was quick to size up the situation. He told me, “Miss, you’re sixteen years old and you are legally able to press charges against your father.” When my father heard this, it got him on his guard. Something like that would jeopardize his job as a prison guard, and he was already having problems due to days lost because of his drinking sprees. My mother had always been afraid to press charges and my father had always managed to talk his way around any policeman that answered a disturbance call at our house up to that time. I did go and press charges and it went back and forth about my father leaving the house.

         Artie wanted to get married when I was seventeen. By that time I was out of school and was working for the National Biscuit Co. I never told any of my employers that I was an epileptic, because I knew by experience that I wouldn’t get the job. There came a day when I had a seizure at work, and I was rushed to the hospital. I expected to get fired, but my bosses were swell. They were satisfied with my work, and in time I became a bookkeeper. (I would continue working there after I married and would leave when I was eight months pregnant with my first child).

         Feeling pressured about the thought of marriage, I began to date another boy I liked very much and gave Artie his ring back. There wasn’t a single marriage around that I considered to be a good one. For a few months I was dating both Artie and a fellow named Sean. One night, at a party with Sean, I felt such an overwhelming desire just to be with Artie. I realized that I would rather be sitting on the front steps of my apartment building with him than be at a party with anyone else. Then, I knew I was ready to risk marriage as long as it was with Artie.

         I told my father that I wanted to get married but would never leave the house as long as he was there. Warning him that it would only be a matter of time before he killed my mother, I asked him how he would feel being on the inside of a prison instead of on the outside. He eventually realized that was the truth and consented to leave. Still, I felt a twinge of guilt, as though it were my fault that my parents were going their separate ways. I hesitated even having my father give me away at my wedding. Visions of a bloodshed reception plagued me. But the day of my wedding, he didn’t have so much as a single drink. That was the finest present he could have given me.

         Artie and I worked in a department store after our regular jobs in order to save the money for our wedding. He worked the elevator and I worked the switchboard. We began to look for a place to live. When Artie tried to put in an application for government housing in Brooklyn, he was told he had to produce a marriage license before they would even accept an application. Even then, it would mean a few months wait before an apartment would be made available. Artie and I decided to go to Maryland and get legally married. This way, we could apply for housing and the allotment checks could go towards our wedding and furnishing our apartment. Artie’s friend, who was stationed at the Navy Yard drove us down to Maryland. We were married by a minister. His wife and Artie’s friend were our witnesses. Afterwards, we went out to eat and then drove home. That was March 3^rd 1956; six months prior to our real wedding. Our apartment became available a few weeks before then. We were married on my 18^th birthday, and the wedding was all I had hoped and prayed for it to be.

Chapter 11

THE LORD’S DRAWING

         I was mentally prepared to face major adjustments in our marriage, but the first seven years were a breeze. That’s not to say that problems didn’t arise; we just were able to respond to them together. The first year we were married, I actually went to a doctor to find out why I couldn’t become pregnant. We were eager to start a family. The birth of our first child, John, was thrilling for us. The following year, our first daughter, Theresa, was born and the year after came our second daughter, Patricia.

         When our daughter Patricia was seventeen months old, she was severely scalded with extremely hot tap water. Managing to get upon the toilet seat, she climbed into the bathroom sink and turned the water on. Her legs were wedged into the small sink and the hot water rising up caused the heavy suede riding pants that she was wearing to adhere to her skin causing severe complications. Both of her legs and stomach were affected and it put her into a state of shock. At one point, her temperature rose to 105 degrees and the doctors didn’t offer much hoper for her survival through the night. They had to remove bandages to bring down her temperature adding to scar tissue and a web like effect behind her knee. An allergy to milk further complicated her recovery and she was given soy bean milk for nourishment.

         Pat had to have nurses around the clock. My childhood girlfriend, Joanne Clarke, was a nurse and volunteered to stay with Pat for one of the shifts. This gave me the opportunity to stay the night with them in the hospital.

         We took out one loan to pay for the nurses and before the first payment was made, we had to take out another one. One day ran into another. It was weeks before we could finally bring her home from the hospital. Even then nothing could touch her skin. In order to provide some warmth for her, Mr. Saulnier, (Pat’s godfather), built a cage to go over her crib and we would put the blankets across the cage. Pat would have to learn to walk all over again. As her healing progressed it became quite apparent to us that she was alert as she was before her injury. We had prayed for this. Meanwhile, our fourth child, Michael, was born on Mother’s Day. He was such a good baby, and he enabled me to give Pat the special care she needed. John and Theresa helped to amuse them both.

         Mrs. Saulnier, Pat’s godmother, was God given to me in those days. She took care of my children while I was in the hospital having my babies and then took care of me as well. Her help was indispensable when Pat was burnt. She was always there to help.

         Our fifth child, Kevin, was born the following year and he missed Father’s Day by one day. He was born with a collapsed lung and was kept in the hospital for a month after his birth. Arriving home, after his birth, I immediately came down with toxemia and have little recollection of the three days I spent in a delirious state. Once again, Mrs. Saulnier was there to take over for me. Kevin also had bronchitis and asthma, for which we would have to routinely rush him to the hospital or doctor’s office in the following years. While he has outgrown this condition, a common cold always hits him harder than the others.

         Being very Catholic minded, birth control was out of the question. I has thought it to be a law of God rather than man’s doctrine. In time I would learn the ovulindex thermometer rhythm method of birth control. It would satisfy my conscience and still exercise a form of control.

         During the times of crisis in my childhood and when my children were seriously ill, I would pray for hours. Usually, it was the rosary that I would repeat over and over again. I would call upon a particular saint for this and another for that. Continually, I would say the short phrases that we called ejaculations. It was suppose to shorten the time that the dead would spend in purgatory, a place between Heaven and Hell. I can only describe my prayer life as a state of bondage and fear.

         As I look back, Artie and I had plenty to keep us busy. In order to move out of an apartment, we took over a rooming house in Flushing, Queens, for two years. It had a beautiful big yard for John and Theresa and the baby on the way at that time. My younger brother, Huey, lived with us for awhile then. Some of our roomers were comical and others were egocentric characters. The wash load was tremendous, and I didn’t have a dryer for some time. I’ll never forget the time we got snowed in and I invited the six roomers into our tiny kitchen for breakfast. My normal routine seemed like nothing after that day.

         After moving from that house to College Point, in Queens, Artie began a part-time limousine service while still holding down his regular job as a bus driver with Queens Transit. This would take us through the next ten years. The children and I would help him polish his car and vacuum the rice up from the weddings as they grew older. I kept the date bookings, mailed out the advertisements and answered the phone. Meanwhile, Artie’s regular bus driving route went right past our house and the children and I would often wave to him as he went by. It was in this house that Pat was burnt.

         Our next move to a new house in Farmingville, Long Island, was a big change and a wilderness experience that I came to hate. It was the middle of winter that we made the move and I was pregnant (unknowingly) with our sixth child. Artie had to be away much of the time, working his regular job and then the limousines on the weekends. Traveling in and out of the city on the Long Island Expressway took another two hours or more of his time. Leaving the contact of family, friends, and public transportation was a change I wasn’t able to handle easily. I felt trapped, isolated and helpless; especially when it came to obtaining medical help for the children when Artie was gone. Out here I was removed from all help from Mrs. Saulnier as well.

         Before long, some of Artie’s friends moved out and they bought the houses that were being built down the road. Charlie and Marie lived across the street and it didn’t look so much like a ghost town anymore. Other bus drivers joined them in the Limousine service and it seemed like Artie’s every spare moment was spent with his friends. He was around the house, but was always working on a car motor or getting junk yard parts. I began to slowly resent Artie, his friends, living out here and life in general. Things went from bad to worse, both emotionally and financially as depression set in. Looking around the living room, going through my daily routine of rearranging the dust and polishing the polish, I thought to myself; “There’s got to be more to life than this.” Feeling miserably unhappy and experiencing a particularly deep depression for more than three months, there seemed to be no way back to the joyful existence that was so normal a few short years ago. Lying in bed one night, I entertained thoughts of escaping the hurt within by killing myself. The hurt was unbearable; I couldn’t see the purpose in life. Thoughts of my marriage, children, and people all around me in varying stages of heartbreak, flooded my mind. Months before, I had arrived at the conclusion that all hope for a mutual caring and sharing relationship in my marriage was gone. I had gone through the cycle of deep love, to resentment, to bitterness, to anger, to hate, and finally to complete indifference. It would never happen to us, I had always thought; but it did. Better marriages than yours have come apart, I told myself, so just accept it as a fact of life and go on. It was a zombie like existence for me, although nothing in the natural around us changed. My husband continued to work his two jobs and I continued to go through the motions of keeping house and raising children. At age 29, I was the mother of four boys and two girls between the ages of 4 and 11. They deserved so much more from me than I was giving. I made a determination in my heart to get myself together for their sakes. There wasn’t anyone around who was capable of caring for them, and honestly, I didn’t feel capable myself. My children were taught how to take care of themselves and each other and me in the advent of an epileptic seizure. However this lingering overwhelming oppression was more than we could handle.

         Turning my thoughts once again to friends and neighbors, I found myself wondering how there could possibly be a God that would allow all the troubles, heartaches, and broken lives and marriages I saw all around me. From the pit of despair, I agonizingly cried out, “God, where are you?” Never for an instant, did I expect an answer of any kind. But then, I didn’t know or believe in a personal God.

         The following morning, I woke up early to find everyone asleep, even Kevin, who was my early bird. As usual, I got dressed and was about to go downstairs to do the laundry. Instead, I went over and flicked the TV on, which was completely out of character for me. It was tuned to a Sunday morning religious program called “Faith For Today.” They were offering a free home study Bible course. I reached for a pen and quickly jotted down the address. Honestly speaking, I can’t say I was searching for God. Truly, He was the One who sought me out, only I wasn’t aware of it. It was sheer boredom and frustration that caused me to send for the Bible Study (I thought). I had no idea that God had heard my outcry and was about to move in my life in so many subtle ways.

         Meanwhile, it was my plan to attempt to find an apartment in the city, divorce my husband, and go on welfare, if necessary, until the children were old enough for me to go to work. I just wanted out of my marriage and my home that I had come to see as a trap. I wanted the freedom to go to a store or just do anything without the necessity of a car. To be independent again and not have to depend on my husband or anyone for food shopping or any need was my immediate goal.

         Driving a car was out of the question because of my epileptic seizures. Not so much as an aura, (some sort of warning sensation) occurred to warn me of an oncoming attack. Medication was a daily necessity, and I was told it lessened the frequency of the attacks. They, nevertheless continued to occur.

CHAPTER 111

A NEW CREATURE IN CHRIST - BORN AGAIN

         The Lord prepared me to become conscious of where I was (spiritually speaking) in such a simple way. As a very young child, my favorite reading books were fairy tale stories. I would always analyze them, and “Humpty Dumpty” was the story that annoyed me the most. Why couldn’t all those men put Humpty Dumpty together again? My mother could glue anything together again. While our son, John, was reading Humpty Dumpty out loud, I commented on the stupidity of the king’s men. With that, he looked at me incredulously and said, “Mom, don’t you know that Humpty Dumpty was an egg?” It was as though a light bulb went on in my head, and I realized how little I knew. I had always thought Humpty Dumpty was a plastic toy! It had never occurred to me that it was an egg! Still another incident occurred when John came home from religious instructions and asked me a question. I gave him my pat catechism answer, but in my heart I heard myself saying, “I don’t know if even I believe that.”

         Within three weeks, the Bible Study arrived in the mail and I found myself eagerly involved in it. Raised as a Roman Catholic and having gone to a Catholic school and high school, I was well informed on “their” church history and doctrine, but had very little knowledge of the Bible. We had always had a large beautiful family Bible in the house, but the only time I opened it was to note baptism or communion dates, etc. The pages were like brand new as I opened them. Guided by the Bible course, I began reading certain sections in order to answer the questions. Reading was always a natural love, so as soon as one course came in, I completed it and returned it, eagerly awaiting the next. Many questions began to twirl around in my head. For the first time, I realized that the entire Bible was written by Jews, through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. There wasn’t a single time that Jesus spoke of joining a church, so questions concerning the various denominations, how they began, what they did and didn’t teach, began to stir in my mind. During the next three years, I experienced such a hunger for the Word of God, that I awoke at 4 a.m. and would read until 7 a.m., stopping to get the children off to school, and then often going right back to it. As soon as one Bible study was completed I would start another. My bicycle was my means of transportation in those days, and I would ride it to the library to comb through the books on religion to research all the information I was uncovering. It was my purpose to disprove the things I was learning, at first. They had to be wrong I reasoned, because I wasn’t taught to believe that way. In an effort to fight back, I wrote to priests and the Knights of Columbus, asking them to prove to me that what I was learning was error. Instead of defending the doctrines of the church, I was simply told that I had to accept their teachings on faith alone, and that I was not to question them. I was also reading the books of Emanuel Swedenborg, Jehovah Witness’ publications, and the “Passover Plot.” The Passover Plot projected theories such as Jesus being given a drug to effect a death-like trance, or that He had a twin brother who portrayed Christ in resurrection. As I later studied the Bible, I realized how ridiculous these theories were. Scripture plainly tells us that the soldiers pierced the side of Jesus and that blood and water flowed out of Him. Any drug in His body would have been drained along with the life sustaining fluids. Also, the Apostle Thomas, was instructed to put his finger in the nail prints of Jesus’ body after the resurrection of Christ to prove to “doubting Thomas” that He was truly Jesus, Himself. Such prints would not have been present on His supposed “twin.” I was also studying publications by Herbert Armstrong from Ambassador College in California and received some teachings that I was in need of at that time. Sifting out truth became a full time job. I began to realize the vast difference between man-made laws and laws of God.

         Gradually I learned how brainwashed I was concerning the worship of Mary, the saints, purgatory, what hell was and wasn’t, and the very plan of salvation, itself.

         The scriptures would show me in Matthew, Chapter 13, verses 55 through 57, that Mary did not remain a virgin after the birth of Jesus. She went on to have other sons and daughters and never sought any attention for herself. I would see where the scriptures said to worship God, alone, and whenever anyone tried to worship the apostles or angels, they were quickly reprimanded. The apostles and angels always refused worship.

         Purgatory isn’t even in the Bible because it doesn’t exist. Furthermore, anyone who received Christ as their personal Savior was called a “saint.” The apostle, Paul, would write letters to the saints in Philippi, Ephesus, and other surrounding towns. Soon, the concept of what sin is in the eyes of God would be revealed to me.

         Finally, I found myself on my living room couch, after having read and meditated on the crucifixion of Christ. “Lord”, I said, “I really believe in you now, but I’m not a sinner. I don’t run around, or steal, or do anything I know to be wrong.” Then the Lord touched me within and showed me what I looked like through His eyes. He showed me the bitterness, the lack of forgiveness, the resentfulness and the dominating spirit I had. Up until that moment, I had just considered these things to be emotions, certainly not sin. You had to be doing something wrong to be a sinner, I thought. But God judges the heart while man judges the act. When the Lord showed me what I looked like through His eyes, I loathed myself and cried out “Lord, if I could just walk out of this body and never return,...I would.” I was thoroughly disgusted with myself. “Lord, I pleaded, if you will cleanse me and save me, I will serve you the rest of my life.” Instinctively, I said, “Thank you, Lord” after that prayer. While I didn’t see or feel anything in particular, (except for deep joy) I had an assurance deep within me that God had indeed heard and accepted my prayer and me.

         Just as I had finished praying, my son, Kevin, spilled a container of milk out in the kitchen, which was a common occurrence in our house. What was not so common, was the way I handled it. I found myself calmly reaching for a dish cloth and handing it to him to wipe up the spill “himself.” He looked at me strangely, expecting me to holler and give him the usual slap on his bottom. Ordinarily, incidents like that were enough to keep me in an agitated state all day. Any other day, I would have cleaned up the spill, “myself”, because the children never would do justice to my polished floor. Something was different! I was a new creature in Christ and was no longer the same. Still, I didn’t grasp it right away nor for some time to come. It would be months before I would realize that bleeding chewed fingernails were a thing of the past as well.

         During the next three years, I don’t even remember how the feelings began to change (for the better) between my husband and myself. Our circumstances didn’t change; everything stayed exactly the same, but I was no longer the same. I didn’t do anything; God did it all. My husband was still inclined to do such things as repairing the lawn mower or a flat tire on my living room rug with only a few scattered newspapers as protective covering. However, on these occasions, that old agitation just wasn’t there. There was a sense of contentment in our home. I became far more relaxed about the house, and the Lord caused me to see a mess as “clean dirt.” Years before, I recalled my husband hollering at me, “You don’t take care of the house for me and the kids, you do it for yourself.” Little did I realize then that I was overcompensating because of the house I had grown up in. The Lord also caused me to look at people and situations outside my home in a completely different way. Up until the time I was “born-again”, I was so wrapped up in my own troubles that I was unable to help myself, much less anyone else. Now, neighbors began coming by and I found myself praying privately everyday for them and the problems they were going through. Rarely did I speak to them of the Lord because I considered it a private matter between an individual and God. Secondly, I didn’t think there was another person around me who had a hunger for the Lord or felt as I did toward Him. Thirdly, I didn’t see myself qualified to teach anyone the things of God.

         Still, it seemed that I was praying to a God way up there. In my mind, it seemed that for a moment God touched me when I accepted Him as my Savior, (more truly when He accepted me) and then returned to Heaven and was no longer in that close personal contact with me. Nevertheless, I continued to pray and read my Bible everyday with much joy and peace.

CHAPTER 1V

THE SPIRIT OF GOD IS GIVEN TO THOSE WHO OBEY

         As I continued to pray and read the Word of God each day, the Lord began the process of cleansing and maturing me, (spiritually). While I no longer held Mary up as coequal with God, I still continued to pray the rosary and had statues of her and the saints throughout the house. The Lord was dealing with me from Exodus 20:3-5, “Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them...” So often I had gathered my children to kneel in front of a statue of Mary to pray the rosary. I thought of it as pleasing to God.

         While the Lord was dealing with me about this, a Jehovah Witness knocked on the door and handed me an AWAKE Booklet. The booklet was entitled “Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me.” It was a word of truth that the Lord wanted to impress upon me at this time.

         During the next three weeks, I began to reason with the Lord about the statues and pictures I had in my home. “How is this displeasing to you?”, I would ask. Finally, after not receiving any answer, I began to reason with myself; if I remove the pictures and statues, I know it is not wrong, and perhaps it is offending to God to have them displayed. “Lord”, I said, “I don’t understand, but I want to do your will above everything. Please give me a sign.” Slowly, I began to remove the pictures and statues. There was a statue of Mary above my front door, and as one of the children ran out, the door slammed and the stature fell, breaking into pieces. There was my sign! I took down all the pictures, the statues, and the crucifixes, then. Jesus is no longer on the cross; He is risen and alive! The one exception was a beautiful statue of Mary in our bedroom. My husband had given it to me at Christmas, and I didn’t want to hurt his feelings. I went to the Lord and told Him I didn’t want to hurt Artie’s feelings. “Lord, help me”, I prayed. When I approached my husband and told him how the Lord was dealing with me about the statues and pictures, he simply said, “If that’s what the Lord wants you to do, just go ahead and do it.” I couldn’t believe he accepted it so easily, although I sensed he was as perplexed as I was.

         Relatives began to make remarks about my new religion. My brother called me on the phone and was concerned about my mental health after hearing about my spiritual house cleaning activities. What they thought didn’t disturb me. My joy and peace of mind made it all worthwhile. It must have been troubling my husband though, because he asked me to make an appointment with a Catholic priest to discuss what was happening. This, I did eager for the opportunity. The priest was not willing to discuss anything and wouldn’t even allow me to question him. In fact, he was arrogant, and as he ushered us out of the rectory, he gave my husband the high-sign to telephone him when we arrived home. Entering the house, my husband told me he was calling the priest at his request. When Artie came out of the bedroom, he told me the priest had told him to bring me to a psychiatrist. “Artie, do you think I’m in need of one?”, I questioned. “No”, he answered, he didn’t even give you a chance.”

         A few weeks later, an article appeared in our daily newspaper, Newsday, concerning the Catholic Church and the celibacy of its priests. Never before had I written to a newspaper, but here I found myself writing a letter to the editor’s column. In it, I simply wrote that the rule of celibacy is a law of man, not of God. Christ, Himself, chose married men as well as single men when He selected the Apostles. I questioned such things as Mass cards and prayer for the dead. The time to care and pray for someone is while they are yet alive. God, alone takes care of the dead, I stated. I added that our minds were given to us to seek out truth and too many of us let others do our thinking for us, and that we had to choose to do our own thinking. Within three weeks, my girlfriend, Gail, from Levittown, N.Y., called to tell me to look in our newspaper. Right in the middle of the page, framed in dark black ink, was my article! I was so surprised and thrilled! Then I promptly forgot about it.

         Six months later, I read a small ad in the Pennysaver requesting volunteers to call a Christian group, FISH OF FARMINGVILLE. When I called, I explained to the girl on the phone that I was an epileptic and couldn’t help with driving. I asked if I could help by answering phones, taking care of children, etc..... She assured me that I could help and asked me my name. When I told her my name, she excitedly shouted, “Praise the Lord”, Thank you Jesus!” I thought she was crazy. Never had I heard anyone say that before. She quickly explained that I was an answer to prayer. Six months before, she had read my article in Newsday and had tried to contact me. The article listed my address as Farmingville, but our phone number was listed under my husband’s part-time limousine service, so she was unable to reach me. She further explained that she and other Christian girls had prayed at a prayer meeting and had asked the Lord to have me contact them and now here it was happening. Her name was Bonnie Dreckmann and she was to become a lifelong friend and support system.

         A few days later, one of the girls from Fish came to pick me up. Her name was Priscilla LaRocca. The Lord had saved her first, and she in turn, led Bonnie, Pauline Hilton and Maria Zabicki to the Lord. FISH OF FARMINGVILLE grew out of that prayer group, and in time the group would touch hundreds for the Lord. Priscilla asked me if I was baptized in the Holy Spirit. I told her I was baptized as a baby. “But”, she said, “I didn’t ask you that. I asked you if you were baptized in the Holy Spirit.” I replied, “Priscilla, I haven’t got the vaguest idea of what you are talking about.” Then she gave me a book called “THE CROSS AND THE SWITCHBLADE” and told me to read it.

         I took that book home and devoured it. My entire supper was prepared and the table set just as I read the last page. I can hardly remember getting supper together, engrossed as I was in it. The book spoke of a beautiful experience with God that was available to any Christian. If only it were true! How could such an experience be true and the whole world not know of it? The nuns and priests never spoke to us about such things. It was perplexing. As soon as supper and the children were taken care of, I got out my Bible and began to read the second chapter of the Acts of the Apostles. It spoke of speaking in tongues and boldness in proclaiming the gospel. Just as I was believing that it was an experience just for the apostles, I read Acts 2:39, which said, “For the promise is unto you, and to your children, and to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God shall call.” Then I read Acts 19 and 1Corinthians, Chapter 12:2, where it states: “A man who speaks in a tongue is talking not to men, but to God. No one understands him, because he utters mysteries in the Spirit.” “It’s all there!”, I exclaimed. How could I have missed it? Still, there was a measure of unbelief. Pauline had prayer meetings at her house in the afternoons. I went three times and enjoyed the Bible study and prayer time, although I was not able to pray out loud the way they did. Words had never come easy to me. The atmosphere was warm and comfortable with the children playing on the floor. I came to call Pauline’s house, “my little church.” Finally, at the third meeting, I said to the girls; “I’ve never heard anyone speak in tongues. I’d like to know more.” They invited me to go to a church in Sayville, Long Island, that Sunday night. It was the first time I had ever gone to a church outside the Catholic faith, except when I went to a synagogue for the bar mitzvah of our next door neighbor, Richard.

         The church was small compared to the ones I was used to. The people were warm and friendly. An Italian woman in her eighties greeted me with a warm welcome. Children of all ages were everywhere. There weren’t any statues or altars. What impressed me most, was a sense of electricity in the air that I felt the moment I set foot in the church. It caused my body to tingle. The people began to sing, and I thought to myself, they’re singing as though they were seeing Jesus right in front of them. It was beautiful. Then they began to sing in another language. It sounded like a choir of angels in perfect harmony.

         The minister began to preach. He read a small portion of the Bible and then he began to explain it verse by verse. I had read that portion many times before but never with such an understanding. In my spirit, I knew every word was truth. Then he asked if anyone was in need of healing. I went forward with an attitude of “I don’t believe any of this and I’m going to prove it’s not true.” The minister asked me what I was in need of. I told him, “I’m an epileptic and I’m asking God to heal me.” First, he prayed for me in English. Then he laid his hands on my head and began praying in another language which I knew was Hebrew, even though I couldn’t understand him. When he laid his hands on my head, it turned me off completely. The only time a priest put his hands on our heads was at Confirmation; when a priest was being ordained or when someone was dying. Absolutely nothing happened. I went back to my seat and sat down totally oblivious to the people around me, although the church was packed. Within myself, I felt something should have happened and it didn’t because I was unworthy. While I was in deep thought, I heard a woman on the other side of the church begin to speak. I never so much as looked up. Till this day I don’t know who she is. She said, “I have a story I want to lift up. There was a little boy named Billy, on a mountain top. He began to slip and grasped onto the edge of the cliff. He cried out for help and he heard a voice in the background and asked, “Who is that?” The voice answered and said, “Billy, this is the voice of God.” Billy said, “Oh I’m so glad you’re here; now you can help me.” The voice of God then said three times “Billy, do you believe?” Billy answered, “Yes, Lord, I believe.” Then the voice of God commanded “Billy, let go!” Billy answered, “What do you think I am...crazy?” (That summed up my feelings).

         I knew that story was intended for me! Everytime the voice of God said, “Do you believe?”, I felt something pierce me deep within to a depth that I didn’t even know existed. Now I know it to be the Word of God that is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart, just as Hebrew, Chapter 4 verse 12 states.

         A few moments later, the minister asked if anyone was seeking the Baptism of the Holy Spirit. This time, I flew up to the front of the church, not caring about anything around me. The minister’s wife came over to me and I asked her, “How do you receive this blessing from God?” She said, “You have already received it. Just thank Him for it.” I didn’t know what she was talking about. I hadn’t received anything. She instructed me to raise my hands and to say, “Thank you, Jesus.” This I did and continued to do it for about eight minutes. The girls who brought me came over and laid hands on me, too. One began praying in Spanish, and another in Chinese. Now I know these women were housewives like myself, and didn’t have the education to know these languages of themselves. Still, nothing happened to me. There was a room off to the side, where coffee and cake was being served. I followed the girls in and took a cup of coffer and sat down at a table over in a corner. People were standing around talking in small groups and children were enjoying their donuts. Facing the wall, I looked at the cup of coffee in front of me, and once again a sense of unworthiness engulfed me as I exhaled deeply. Suddenly, I saw a vision of the Lord in front of me. He was huge and appeared as a pure white cloud in the form of a man. I couldn’t see His face. Then I saw myself falling from a great height in this vision. I was very tiny and falling rapidly; tumbling over and over again in a downward motion. Then I saw myself fall into the hands of the outstretched arms of the Lord and felt a stirring in the depths of my being (belly), and felt something rise up within me as I began to praise God in a language I had never learned. I was aware I was praying in Hebrew. Time stood still!!! I don’t know how long I praised the Lord in tongues. But when I opened my eyes, the children were still playing and the people standing and talking in groups as before. I felt such a love for every single person in that room. I wanted to take each and every one of their faces and cradle them in my hands. They would think I was crazy, but I had to tell them what happened. I couldn’t contain myself. Amazingly, they understood, because God had made Himself real to them in one way or another, as well.

         I was on cloud nine. Jesus had touched me and I would never be the same again. Every word in the Bible was true and I knew, that I knew, that I knew! That night, the song, “NOW I BELONG TO JESUS AND JESUS BELONGS TO ME”, became my song. That date was January 9^th, 1972; my younger brother’s birthday. I remember calling him the next day and telling him, it was “his” birthday, but “I” got the present!

CHAPTER V

WALKING IT OUT BY FAITH

         Coming home that night I couldn’t imagine where to begin to tell my husband about all that had happened. I’m a skeptic and my husband is twice as bad. As I came in the house my husband looked at me rather oddly and asked me to make him a cup of coffee. I brought it into the living room and he said to me, “Alright, tell me what happened.” What do you mean, I asked? He replied, “Something happened. It’s written all over you.” Later he told me there was a glow all over my face.

         As I told him all that had happened, he listened attentively and then said, “This language, can you speak it again?” I don’t know, I answered, but if you let my lay hands on you and pray for your salvation, we’ll see what happens.” What have I got to lose, he replied. As I prayed I found I was able to pray in other languages at any given moment. My husband looked at me attentively and posed a question that troubled me considerably. He said, “Mary, how do you know this language isn’t from Satan?” I knew Satan to be the deceiver of all the ages and that he often comes as a religious spirit to counterfeit the true blessings of God. That night I came before the Lord and told Him, “Lord, I don’t care how beautiful this experience is, if it’s not from you, I don’t want any part of it. I need a sign to confirm this experience is from you just as I believe.” The Lord graciously granted my request. My husbands worked nights and it was my custom to kneel with the children in the living room to pray with them before bedtime. As we were praying, each of the children, in turn, began to ask God for something. “Wait a minute, kids”, I broke in. “Don’t you ever take the time to thank God for all He has already given you? Don’t you ever praise Him just for Who He is?” “He is the Great I Am.” My son, Kevin said, oh I know there are lots of ways to pray, like that crazy Italian way you pray. That’s what we’re going to do right now, as I began to praise God in tongues. My fourteen year old daughter, Theresa, began to pull my elbow very excitedly and said, Mommy, I know what you are saying and I’ll prove it. With that, she ran into her bedroom and came out with a book she had just finished reading called “A NEW SONG” by Shirley and Pat Boone. She frantically went through the pages searching for something. When I saw how intent she was, I said, wait a minute Theresa. Maybe God wants to show us something since it came during prayer. So I closed the book and asked the Lord to please show us what He wanted us to know. Closing my eyes I opened the book and my finger was pointing to the very words Theresa wanted to show me. When Shirley Boone received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit she spoke in Latin the words, Ava Diem, which means “praise God.”

         Her husband, Pat, had studied for the ministry and understood what she was saying. Unknown to me I was speaking those same words and my daughter recognized them. The Holy Spirit witnessed to me that I was indeed praising the Lord, Jesus Christ, and a deep peace settled over me. That was the confirmation I needed. Satan would never allow me to praise God in tongues because he wants praise and worship for himself alone.

         Another confirmation came within a few days when my twelve year old daughter, Pat, was baptized in the Holy Spirit in our living room. My husband is a volunteer fireman and emergency medical technician. As he rushed out to answer a call, my daughter and I knelt to pray for the people involved and for the safety of the men. Suddenly, I realized my daughter was praying in tongues. I excitedly asked her if she felt anything or if the Lord showed her something. She answered, ”No, and I’m glad He didn’t. I would have been scared to death.”

         Other things began to happen in quick succession. For instance, whenever I would attempt to pray the rosary at my bedside, I would fall asleep on my knees. While I no longer held Mary and the saints in such high esteem as I had previous to being born again, I still continued a devotion to Mary, which I was suddenly unable to do. There was a keen awareness within me of a struggle and I prayed “Lord, show me what’s happening.” The Lord gently began to deal with me over a short period of time. He showed me how, in my mind, my conception of Him was so small and limited that I thought He needed all the help He could get. That was why I prayed to Mary and the saints. Then He reminded me that He created all the earth and the heavens with no assistance from them at all. It dawned heavily on me that He was the Creator of Mary and the saints as well. As the Lord continued to delve into and expose the thoughts of my inner being, I realized these thoughts and practices were an abomination to Him. I was shocked! I questioned Him about all the healings and miracles at Fatima and Lourdes, (places where apparitions of Mary took place and were promoted by the Catholic Church). How could it not be you? He began to reason with me and pointed out how at these apparitions, Mary alone was lifted up. The Bible says in 1Timothy, Chapter 2 verse 5; For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Yet, Mary said at Fatima, my immaculate heart will be your comfort and the way which will lead you to God. Jesus said in John, Chapter 14 verse 6; I am the way, the truth and the life: No man cometh unto the Father, but by me. Yet Mary told one of the Fatima children he would go to heaven, but would have to say many rosaries. We receive salvation by receiving Jesus and all He did for us at Calvary, not by anything we can do or say.

         Other requests at these various apparitions were for churches to be built in her honor, cloth scapulars to be worn, and medals were to be cast in her honor and promises that she would keep and protect those wearing these scapulars from hell. Only Jesus saves.

         There were the constant requests to say the rosary in her honor, but Matthew, Chapter 6 verse 7 says; When you pray, use not the vain repetitions, as the heathen do; for they think they shall be heard for their much speaking. Then there was the constant threat of purgatory when the Word of God says in 11Corinthians, Chapter 5 verse 8; We are confident, I say, and willing rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord. Jesus said to the “good thief” upon the cross, “Verily to you am I saying today, with Me shall you be in paradise.” He paid the price for our sins so that we would not have to. The only so called purgatory is the process of purging that the Holy Spirit takes believers through to correct them in this life. That’s done by His spiritual fire. Our God is a consuming fire; Hebrews, Chapter 12 verse 29.

         The Lord would later sum up my lying belief system for me in this scripture verse from the Book of Revelation in Chapter 16 verse 14; For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth, and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty. Satan caused the apparitions of Mary. It was a hugh hoax by religious spirits to siphon off the worship that is due God alone to another source. So many were being deceived just as I was. How could I have been so gullible? No wonder the Bible calls Satan the god of this world. He does so much of his deception under the cover of religion and religious rituals.

         Overwhelmed by these revelations that the Lord was giving me, I acknowledged His Truth. With that I felt a gripping in my being and actually felt something pull out of me in a writhing way. It left me weakened and my body felt sore as I knelt by my bedside. It was months later that I realized I was delivered of a spirit of Mariolatry that some of the older dictionaries describe as the worship, service and adoration of the Virgin Mary. I didn’t even know there was such a word. My smaller up-to-date dictionary didn’t even have the word in it.

         Still more was taking place. From the night I received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, I accepted healing as an epileptic by faith and stopped taking medication. Three weeks later I had a seizure and started taking medication again. My husband said, “Where is your God now?” The children questioned how I could be healed and still have seizures. I was crushed!!! Coming before the Lord, I asked Him how could this have happened? You are God and you are in control of all things. After a few moments I calmed down and I told the Lord, “It doesn’t matter if you choose not to heal me. I know you love me and anything you want to do or not do is fine with me.” Then the Lord spoke to me from within and said “I have healed you. I want you to drive.” His words shocked me so much that I ran from the bedroom. Those words were the last words I wanted to hear. The thought of driving a car overwhelmed me. If I were ever to have a seizure while driving, I might kill someone and I would never be able to bear that. Whenever I had a seizure there was no warning whatsoever.

         For three weeks the battle went on. Every time I attempted to pray the Lord spoke to me, “I have healed you. I want you to drive.” Finally, in desperation I said to the Lord “If you want me to drive, give me a good car for absolutely nothing as a sign that it is your perfect will for me.” With that the burden lifted and I was able to pray about other things. To be perfectly honest I forgot about that prayer and I felt relieved. However, the Lord didn’t forget.

         Within two months I was given a perfectly good car for absolutely nothing. Tony and Gail Moran are dear friends of ours that we have known for a long time. They had six children and had just purchased a station wagon for their growing family. This particular Saturday they came out to visit us and announced that they wanted to give me their old car which was in fine condition. I told them, “You know I don’t drive and I have no intention of driving.” They just said we got this car on our honeymoon and it means a lot to us and so do you. We want you to have it.” My husband, Artie, told Tony to write out a bill of sale saying he sold the car to me for a dollar. But Tony steadfastly refused to do it and wrote out on a piece of paper, “This is a gift to Mary Jane Sears.” Immediately, I knew it was the Lord moving in the circumstances. I was both awed and frightened. Guess I’m not the adventurous type.

         The Lord was moving me into an open battlefield and I was going to have to possess the land little by little and I didn’t feel equal to it. The obstacles I would have to overcome loomed over me like giants in the land. For the first year I wouldn’t even start up the car without prayer. Every short trip was like a challenge to me and I felt continually drained at the wheel. It was always a relief to get home. At times I would get two or three blocks from the house and all sense of direction would leave me. Panic would attempt to seize me; and I would pray and the Lord would lift the confusion. Getting lost on short trips around the area frustrated me continually. Pinecrest was the name of the church I attended. It was only twenty minutes away from our house, but it was months before I had the directions straight in my head. To explain the inner turmoil I was experiencing to someone else would only come across as pure foolishness to them. Again and again I would tell the Lord, I am only driving because you want me to.

         Prophesy is a word from God, usually given by a minister at a gathering of believers, either to an individual or to all. The few personal words of prophesy that I have received have been precious to me. My first prophesy was on Feb. 22, 1974, through a visiting woman minister whom I had never met before. It came at the time of my early driving experiences, while I was still struggling through. She said under the anointing of God, “Thank you Father, for the encouragement of your Spirit. Thank you for the light in which to walk, bringing souls in varying circumstances to you. Thank you Lord, for giving her a ministry of your love, Lord, that transforms and lifts. Give her a hold and give her even this night a higher hold upon the mountains as she ascends and may there be an apprehension and a grasping of a higher realm. Thank you Lord, that you go before her in a new and stepped up way. She shall triumph in you. Satan has said that she could not, but Satan is a liar. She shall in you hold the power to triumph.” I was greatly encouraged and in need of that promise from the Lord.

         It amazed me as I looked back to see how the Lord had opened the door for me to obtain a driver’s license even before I knew Him as my personal Savior. My husband had encouraged me to get my license just for the sake of any emergency. The law read that I would have to be free of seizures for three years and under the care of a doctor. From 1964 to 1967 I was seizure free and obtained my license during that period. It was the only time that a span of three years between seizures occurred.

         The Lord protected me and gave me guidance time and time again while I was driving. On two occasions the Holy Spirit commanded me to stay still even though the green light was flashed. It was a dark night and a black van (without his headlights on) jumped the light at high speed and cut right across in front of me. A collision would have been inevitable had I not obeyed. On the second occasion, a boy on a high speed bike cut across in front of me from out of the darkness. Hitting him would have been unavoidable. Yet another time, I was going up a steep hill in a new pick-up truck with my children in the back. It was nighttime again and as I approached the top of the hill, I instinctively flashed my high beams just in time to brake the truck. There were six teenagers walking up the hill, linked arm in arm across the road in front of me. They would have been completely out of my view if it weren’t for the high beams. Their faces reflected their sobering expressions as their chorus line broke up fast.

         Another time I was leaving Smithtown Hospital at the height of rush hour and would have had to enter an intersection of bumper to bumper traffic. “Lord, I just can’t handle that right now. I need your help.” The Holy Spirit at once directed me to turn left and took me through a development that turned right out to the road I wanted. A way that seemed to be in the opposite direction to my way of thinking, I might add. His ways are definitely not ours. Several of my friends now use this easy exit.

         There was no doubt in my mind that the Lord was using me to minister to the spiritual and physical needs of the people who called upon our prayer group organization, FISH OF FARMINGVILLE. Without the use of a car it would have been impossible. When yet another seizure occurred ten minutes after I had driven home one night, I again determined to give up driving. Once again, I felt overwhelmed as the Lord began to deal with me. The Lord told me to continue walking out my healing on the faith of His Word to me. It was like walking a tightrope as I determined to trust and obey.

CHAPTER V1

EXPERIENCES ALONG THE WAY

         After receiving the Baptism of the Holy Spirit I would speak to anyone about the things of God at the drop of a hat. My husband cautioned me to let up, warning me that the people I spoke to would consider me crazy. Attempting to be a submissive wife, I came before the Lord and asked Him what I should do. With that I opened my Bible to 11Corinthians, Chapter 12 verse 1and the words jumped up at me as I read, “I must go on boasting, however useless it may be, and speak of visions and revelations of the Lord.” Going outside, I showed the scripture to my husband and he said, “If that’s what the Lord wants you to do, go ahead,” And go ahead, I did.

         A few days after my experience with the Lord I was on the phone with a woman who called FISH for some information. I spoke to her well over an hour and promised to send her some Christian books, which I did. Three months later I met Edna in person. She was a woman about 62 years of age with a warm motherly embrace. She began to speak to me about her life, telling me her husband had committed suicide three years earlier and that she continuously suffered with acute emphysema as well as loneliness. The day we had our phone conversation, she had planned to take her own life. After our conversation, she said to herself, “If a woman with six children can take time out of her day to talk to me and send me books, there must be something worthwhile in this life to hold onto.” Edna went on to accept the Lord, be baptized in the Holy Spirit and was a joy to many in the body of Christ until the Lord took her home some four years later. Her spiritual family made her wake a celebration of thanksgiving.

         So many times people would come back to me and tell me something happened to them when I prayed with them. Often they thanked me for some word of advice I had given them which I couldn’t even recall doing. Truly it was the Holy Spirit within me meeting the needs of these people, for I was neither aware nor equipped to handle their needs by myself. Our AVAILABILITY rather than our CAPABILITY counts with the Lord.

         There was another supernatural experience that occurred in (of all places) Waldbaum’s Supermarket. As I entered the store through the swinging door, I had the immediate sense of being lifted out of my body and once again felt the presence of the Lord all about me. I watched the other customers walk up and down the aisles taking things from the shelves. I wanted to shout to them, don’t you know He’s here. He loves you. Why are you ignoring Him? What you are doing is so unimportant compared to His presence here. But there wasn’t any awareness from any of them. I don’t remember any of my normal shopping routine that day for being so enraptured in the Lord and what He was showing me.

         Lessons in the Lord were rapidly coming along. I can recall being heavily burdened for a dear friend and nothing I said or did seemed to be of any help. I dropped to my knees and poured out my heart to the Lord and He instructed me to cast out a spirit of grief, which I did. I didn’t even know there was such a thing. Results happened immediately and the entire family came to the Lord. Later I was to learn that the death of her father at an early age had left her bitter towards God and deep grief had set in. But the Lord gave deliverance.

         On still another occasion the Lord woke me from a sound sleep on a Wednesday morning at 4:00 a.m. with an awareness that my younger brother, Huey, was in trouble. I got out of bed and knelt down in the living room and began to pray intensively for my brother in tongues, not knowing the problem. My husband heard me and asked what was going on. I just told him that the Lord let me know my brother was in trouble and that I had to pray for him. He looked puzzled and went back to bed. Forty-five minutes later, I felt the burden lift and I went back to bed. The following Saturday, my brother and his family came for the weekend. As Huey walked into the house he said, “Look Sis, I don’t want to hear about your Jesus or your religion.” “Okay Huey”, I said. With that the Holy Spirit caused a quickening within me and I knew I had to speak to him. Huey was about to pour coffee for his wife, Marcia, and us. “I’ve just got to tell you this one thing”, I blurted out. As I related what took place that Wednesday morning, my brother took his wife’s hand and they both sat down at the kitchen table with tears in their eyes. Huey said to me, “What do we have to do to be saved?” With that they both prayed the sinner’s prayer and accepted the Lord as their personal Savior. Puzzled by the abrupt turn of events, I quickly began to question them about what was going on. They both began to talk at once. Marcia tearfully explained how that Wednesday morning my brother came home drunk and an argument developed. It grew to the point that he had his hands around her throat and was literally choking her with all his strength in a rage. Suddenly a deep calm came over him and everything stopped. It was at the very time the Lord had me pray for him. I’m very happy to proclaim that my brother no longer drinks.

         There was another time that the Lord woke up my friend, Bonnie, at 12:30 a.m. to pray for my older son, John, who was in the Air Force in Louisiana. At that precise time my son was involved in a head-on collision. The trooper who came on the scene said he could hardly believe my son and his friends were alive with the way the front of the car was smashed in. The windshield was flush against John’s face when they were found. His knees were badly cut and required many stitches, leaving a nasty scar. His fiancee, Janet, had stitches in her chin which healed beautifully. Another girl had all her teeth knocked out. The people in the other car were drunk and were racing on the wrong side of the road, against another car. They also survived the accident. John was the only one released from the hospital several hours after the accident with only a limp. Bonnie would find out the following day why the Lord woke her to pray.

         It is imperative that we be obedient to the prompting of the Holy Spirit whether we understand the circumstances or not. Our willingness to be a useful instrument in the hands of God could mean the difference between life and death for someone. There are also many times the Lord will have us pray for someone and the results may never be known until the Lord reveals it to us face to face in His Kingdom. I call it being instant in season.

         Another mighty work of God was the night He delivered my mother from alcohol. She was in a state of wonderment as she related what she remembered from her experience. It definitely loses much in the retelling and is one of those times where “it’s bette felt than telt”. She found herself downtown in a stupor and walked into the lounge of one of the bigger hotels. Everyone was fancily dressed and the place was elegant. The drinks were very expensive, so she told the waiter she wanted a glass of beer which took the last dollar she had. She thought to herself, imagine that, a dollar for a tiny little bottle of beer. As she looked around she came to herself and said, I don’t belong here.” She said it was the strangest feeling of an outside source giving her a deep revelation of herself. She doesn’t remember how she got home without any money. The next morning she woke up still in a state of bewilderment, knowing something happened to her, but she wasn’t quite sure what. It was then that she realized she didn’t have that powerful urge to go to the refrigerator for her usual beer. In fact she had no desire for alcohol at all. The Lord had actually taken her desire for alcohol away from her. That was something AA (God bless them) and all her own self efforts had never been able to do. Gone forever were the phone calls I use to receive in the middle of the night, her deep depressions, and the times she would always have to say she was sorry to those she loved. ALLELUIA!!! Her deliverance from alcohol had been one of our family’s most urgent prayer request. So many of our prayers were answered one after the other. It was as though we were plugged into a high power connection and all systems were go, or should I say “God”.

         When I began driving, I said to the Lord, what I need is a car coat instead of my bulky coat. It wasn’t even a verbalized prayer. The next day my girlfriend, Kathy, came over and gave me a beautiful car coat. She had gotten a new one and she wanted to know if I could make use of her old one. Time and again the Lord provided beautiful clothing for me even to lovely gowns and furs for our family weddings. It was a source of delight to me to watch how a skirt from one person and a jacket from another would create a perfectly coordinated outfit that I wouldn’t have been able to find in a store. I chuckled when I realized that when I began to put on a few pounds, the clothes began coming to me a size larger. Then when I lost a few pounds the reverse was true. Our Heavenly Father was meeting all our needs and desires as well. We learned to pray about everything small and great. Worry became a thing of the past as we faced each challenge with prayer.

         There were times that the Lord spoke to me in a dream or gave me a word of knowledge for friends and neighbors and I saw results take place. There were times I hesitated doing what the Lord wanted because of my own natural fears. I soon learned to surrender my own will for the peace that accompanied walking in obedience.

         One day my neighbor, Diane, came over. She had been married for five years and both she and her husband, Vinny, were longing for children. The doctors gave them little encouragement. She had just about given up hope. I talked to her about the Lord. Then I said to her, “Diane, I know you don’t believe as I do, but I’ve got enough faith for both of us to believe God can cause you to have a baby of your own. Will you let me pray for you?” It can’t hurt, she replied, as I laid hands on her and prayed.

         Within a few months she was pregnant and gave birth to a little girl named Lisa. The following year the Lord gave a double portion when Michael was born. We have not because we ask not with a believing heart and trust in God.

         Another neighbor was hospitalized for leukemia. One of the boys in the neighborhood told me the doctors told the family she only had a few hours to live. I was playing a game with my children at the time and the Lord told me I was to go to the hospital, but not immediately. We finished the game and I left. My husband had shown me a short cut to this hospital. As I started out, it was raining. I couldn’t remember where the turnoff was and I made a wrong turn. The Lord had me make a quick left and I was right on the road that I wanted. Arriving at the hospital, it was past visiting hours and the lights were all turned down. I prayed, Lord, make a way. I told the receptionist who I wanted to see. She promptly told me no one by that name was in the hospital. I informed her that the patient was only given hours to live and she checked another list and found the name. She picked up the phone and told the nurse on the second floor that this woman’s “daughter” was here to see her. I hadn’t told her who I was and evidently only the family was allowed to visit. Putting a mask on, I went into the room. My neighbor seemed to be unconscious. I called her name and she was instantly alert. She knew who I was. We talked and I explained the plan of salvation to her. She accepted the Lord and I prayed for the Lord to comfort her family. Arriving home, my children informed me that the woman’s family pulled into the driveway right after I left. That was why the Lord had me wait. They wouldn’t have understood. The next day my neighbor informed her family that she was very pleased that I had come, but they felt sure she was just hallucinating. The Lord took her home two days later.

         Becoming sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit was a slow process. Christmas Day, my in-laws were out visiting us and were getting ready to go to the Catholic Church. While I no longer attended the Catholic Church, I thought it would be the Christian thing to do by going along with them. I felt a hesitation within my spirit and decided to stay home by myself for no apparent reason. They weren’t gone for more than five minutes when the phone rang and it was my husband’s boss. A few months before I had visited him in the hospital and witnessed to him about the Lord. His breathing was labored as he said “Hello Mary. I think it’s time we talked.” We talked for a long time and he prayed the sinners prayer with me and we said good-bye. A month later Phil died and the assurance of his salvation was very comforting. A very similar situation took place with my husband’s uncle as well as a few others.

         It was especially gratifying for me to see the ones I led to the Lord begin to step out and minister to their families and circle of acquaintances. Crisis after crisis was met by prayer and mutual encouragement. The Lord is an expert at having us at the right place at the right time to accomplish His purposes. The ways in which He maneuvered us into hospitals to visit the sick and terminally ill against the odds of visiting hours and no admittance areas was a source of wonder to me and my spiritual sisters.

         A year later, I watched how the Lord prepared my friend, Vicky, for the death of her husband, Ray. He had a long bout with lung cancer and towards the end the Lord gave him a peace and the inner turmoil ceased. His home going was a time of victory and joy that only those who truly know the comfort of the Lord can hope to experience. Although our loved ones are absent from the body, their spirits have returned to the Presence of the Lord, to the One Who loves them more than we do. There are still some hard times for Vicky and her three children as the Lord continues to be faithful in His financial and spiritual provisions.

         There are several other incidents with various people that the Lord brought about that I am not at liberty to speak about. Some situations He is still dealing with. He is always on the move.

         Once, while at a meeting, a minister challenged us to believe God for $100 to give back to the Lord. I felt impressed to do this even though I had no idea where the money could come from. I went home and told Artie what I had done and he said, if $100 comes in unexpectedly you can give it to the Lord. Naturally, he was humoring me. The following day, however, I got a money order for exactly $100 from my son, John. We had given him money for his plane fare months ago with no expectation of having him return it. Artie agreed to give it to the Lord.

         I can remember being in my bedroom one night, and thanking the Lord that there was nothing left in my house that was displeasing to Him. He said, yes there is. You still have a book written by Swedenborg. No Lord, I protested, I threw them all out. Then He said, it’s in the closet in the green waste basket. Half in disbelief I went to the closet and pulled out the books that were in the basket, not expecting to find anything. There, right at the bottom of the pile was a book by Swedenborg. Forgive me Lord, for my unbelief.

         Little things that are important to us are important to God, as well. He knows our individual needs and gives each of us what we need. A few years ago (before the Lord gave me enlightment) I was busy with Christmas duties and the Lord impressed me to go in and pray. Not now, Lord, I must get done. Still the impression pressed me. Just let me put my meat in the oven, I silently answered. A few minutes into praying, the Holy Spirit impressed me that my oven wasn’t on. I distinctly remember turning the oven on, I told the Lord. Going into the kitchen, I checked. Sure enough I had turned the oven on, but it had never ignited. There wasn’t even a smell of gas. The Lord was teaching me that if I put Him first, He would help me work out the smallest details of my life.

         It happened still another time, that I had, indeed, forgotten to turn on the oven. While I was out, the Lord spoke to me and I had to return earlier to have my meal prepared at the proper time.

         While I worked at the local Teen Center one night a week, I was able to identify with the teenagers who spoke of living with alcoholic parents. I would tell them about the Lord and they even published a little poem the Lord had given me in their newsletter. It went like this:

“THE SAVING ACCOUNT”

Do you have an account in the Jesus Christ

Precious Blood Bank?

It is an inexhaustible account that covers

all our needs and deeds.

Open day and night, Jesus is always there

to serve.

His motto is “Ask and you shall receive”

Belief and obedience are the only collateral

you need.

It is a real Trust Account you can bank on

for this age,

old age, and the age to come. That’s

SECURITY !!!

The balance is always in our favor;

We just have to apply for it

and receive its’ many dividends.

His Saving Account is run on interest

“Seek and ye shall find”

it in the Bible.

The Bible is your bank book and checking

account.

LOOK INTO IT.

Let’s all give Jesus a run on

His bank.

         When my son, Michael, who was about 12 years old then, heard some of the teenagers refer to me as a Jesus freak, he became enraged and tried to come to my defense. When I told him that Christians have to expect that from people who don’t know Jesus, he asked, why do you take that? For and with Jesus you can take anything!!!

         Two other poems we put in the newsletter were the 23^rd Psalm and The 23^rd Channel by unknown authors. They go like this:

DERIVED FROM THE 23^RD PSALM

King Heroin is my shepherd, I shall always

want.

He maketh me to lie down in the gutters.

He leadeth me beside the troubled waters.

He destroyeth my soul.

He leadeth me in the paths of wickedness.

Yea, I shall walk through the valley of

poverty.

And will fear no evil for thou, Heroin, are

with me.

Thy Needle and Capsule comfort me.

Thou strippest the table of groceries in the

presence of my family.

Thou robbest my head of reason.

My cup of sorrow runneth over.

Surely heroin addiction shall stalk me

All the days of my life.

And I shall dwell in the House of the Damned

forever.

THE 23^RD CHANNEL

The TV set is my shepherd; my spiritual

growth shall want.

It maketh me to sit down and do nothing for

His name’s sake,

Because it requireth all my spare time.

 It keepeth me from doing my duty as a

Christian; because it presenteth

so many good shows that I must see.

It restoreth my knowledge of the things of

the world, and keepeth me from the study of

God’s Word.

It leadeth me in the paths of failing to

attend the evening worship services, and

doing nothing in the Kingdom of God.

Yea, though I live to be a hundred, I shall

keep on viewing my TV as long as it will

work, for it is my closest companion.

It’s sound and it’s picture, they comfort

me.

It presenteth entertainment before me, and

keepeth me from doing important things with

my family.

It fills my head with ideas which differ

from those set forth in the Word of God.

Surely, no good thing will come of my life,

because my TV offereth me no good time to

do the will of God;

Thus I will dwell in the place of the

devil and his angels forever.

         About this same time, our family doctor became very sick and was close to death. We prayed for his recovery and God granted it. While keeping an appointment for one of my children, I spoke to the doctor about his experience. I told him God spared him for a purpose and he solemnly prayed the sinner’s prayer for salvation with me. I’m afraid I got carried away as I laid hands on him and prayed in tongues asking the Lord to use him in the healing ministry. This was one time the doctor was flustered instead of the patient.

         On another occasion, I was in the same doctor’s office and his associate, an older Jewish doctor, came through. Without a word of warning or so much as an hello, he said, “Mary, where am I going when I die?” I was so taken back by the question I said, “What did you say?” He looked at me so pathetically and then embarrassed. All I could think of on the spur of the moment was; “We have to be born again.” He then hurried down the corridor to his next patient. Later, I would give him the book, THE CROSS AND THE SWITCHBLADE, and leave a few salvation tracts on his desk. These questions are an explanation of the void that each of us have within us to know the God that created us.

         Another time, I was in a specialists’ office, who did skin graft work on my daughter, Patricia. The walls in his office were full of awards. When he came in, I said “Your awards are very impressive, but is your name written in the Book of Life?” He answered, “I’m Jewish, and that’s not in our Bible.” I told him it was, but I couldn’t remember where. Later, I found it in Daniel, Chapter 12 verse 1 and in Malachi, Chapter 3 verse 16. The Lord sent a tract across my path that spoke about the Book of Life. It was just perfect for the doctor and I mailed it to him.

         A disturbing experience for me and other girls in our prayer group was the death of a teenage girl named Debbie. She was the daughter of another Christian sister. Debbie was badly injured in an automobile accident near our shopping mall. Three weeks prior to the accident she prayed with me and accepted the Lord in her own living room. At that time, I put the question to her; If the Lord were to take your life today, where would you go? There was thoughtful consideration aroused in her and she agreed to pray the sinner’s prayer. Little did I know what a leading question that would prove to be. At the scene of the accident other Christians were in prayer for her. She was hospitalized in a coma and hooked up to machines. We all prayed, fully expecting her to be healed. Yet, she died. All of us questioned God as to why, either verbally or in our hearts. While in group prayer, one of the girls, Pauline, said someone has a word of knowledge here. The Lord had just spoken to me and I spoke out “Perfect healing is being out of the body and in the presence of the Lord.” Truly that is the ultimate healing.

         Returning home shortly before Christmas, one year, I found myself behind a car with a sticker that simply read Santa Claus. But, when I looked at it the words “SATAN’S CLAWS” jumped out at me. I recognized it as an alert from the Lord. Arriving home, I received a call from the postmaster asking me to stop in and see him at the post office. When I got there he explained how the post office receives Santa Claus letters at this time of year and he wanted to place them in our Fish organization postal box. Going on, he suggested that we answer these letters with some sort of a Santa Claus message. The “SATAN’S CLAWS” immediately came to my mind and I began to realize why. I would have been tempted to humor him and at least verbally go along with him. Quickly, I told him I couldn’t do that, since lifting up Jesus is the real meaning of Christmas. He smiled in puzzlement at first and then in agreement. I knew it was for just this purpose that the Lord alerted me. But I didn’t know it was just the beginning of experiences the Lord would take me through to purge me of man made traditions and belief systems that are an abomination to Him. I later returned and gave the postmaster some salvation tracts and the book, THE CROSS AND THE SWITCHBLADE.

         There are several inner healings that the Lord has given me. Whenever it would start to get dark, around 5:00 P.M., a dark gloom would come over me. There was no reason for it. Everything would be fine and still it would happen. I attended a church service in which a minister prayed for us for inner healings. At home, the Lord brought back the memories of how I would wait at the subway station for my father at 5:00 P.M., just as it was getting dark. If I didn’t see him come down those steps, I would feel a lump in my stomach, knowing full well the implications. It would be another bloody scene when he got home drunk. The Lord not only revealed why I felt the gloom; He also lifted it, never to return.

         Another phobia I had would cause me to stop short at my front door, as I was leaving my house, if there were people out front. I knew I was doing it, but I didn’t know why. The Lord revealed more childhood memories to me. Whenever my father caused a violent scene in our apartment the night before, I would be so ashamed the next day that I couldn’t bear to face the neighbors that would be standing outside our apartment building. Usually, I would stop short in the vestibule, collect myself, and then rush right past them. Once the Lord caused me to see the reason, He lifted the shame and humiliation that had been imparted along the way. I call the Lord my psychiatrist. Unlike other psychiatrists, He has the power to, not only reveal, but to heal as well.

         Just one other experience comes to my mind that I would like to share. While helping a family that had contacted our FISH organization, I met a woman named Helen. Helen was a mental patient that was living in a place that housed about ten other people with mental problems. She was a woman, about 45 years old, and reminded me of a farm woman. Her frightened pathetic gaze drew me to her immediately. She wasn’t easy to befriend as she continually paced and chain smoked, snorting smoke through her nostrils like a dragon. Fears permeated her very being. She had a fear of eating, getting dressed or undressed, washing, and especially of the unknown. Every other sentence she uttered was “I’m afraid.”

         My friend Vicky and I visited Helen. She began to talk to us about voices that were saying frightening things to her. Instinctively, I commanded the demon to identify itself. With that we heard, “My name is Legion” in Helen’s own voice, but we knew it was not her speaking. We questioned her a few moments later and she had no recollection of hearing or speaking anything. At the time it happened there was no sense of fear, but coming home and discussing and realizing what took place made my knees go limp.

         A week later, I was alone again with Helen. Without warning an eerie masculine voice began to speak through her. It stated that it had entered into her at birth and that it was going to destroy her and all her family. Again, I commanded it to identify itself and it said it was “Jesus, the second.” That really puzzled me. I was under the impression that demons couldn’t even so much as speak the Name of Jesus.

         When I arrived home, I immediately called Priscilla, a Christian sister. She dropped everything and sought the Lord for wisdom. Two hours later she called me back and the Lord revealed to her that it was a theatrical demon. I was later to learn that Helen, as a young girl, had an overwhelming desire to be on the stage and had evidently opened herself to these demonic forces.

         We had a minister who had an anointing in the deliverance ministry. Few of us know what the Lord meant when He spoke the words “deliver us from evil”, when He taught the apostles the manner in which they were to pray. Brother Beasley had knowledge of it along with the word of authority to cast out demons as Jesus and His apostles did. I obtained permission to bring Helen to Pinecrest, my home church in Setauket, N.Y. where Brother Beasley was ministering that week. For forty-five minutes I tried to persuade her to overcome her fear of getting into my car so we could go. Exhausted with my futile attempts, I told the Lord “I give up.” Next thing I know, she steps into the opened rear door and sits down like a caged animal. Driving to the church was a challenge for me. I didn’t know whether she would pounce upon my neck while I was driving or what. My eyes were half on the road and half on my rear view mirror. Was I ever glad to pull into the parking lot. Getting her out of the car and into the church building was yet another challenge. We had to wait a short while and I was afraid she would try to run out. The deliverance minister spoke with her and began to bind and cast out the spirits that were tormenting her. I did not notice any particular manifestations of demonic release as I had witnessed on a very few occasions with other people. Nevertheless, when we left Pinecrest she had a calmer attitude and appeared more alert. When we got to the car I was prepared for another battle. She shocked me by opening the car door on the passengers’ side and comfortably settling herself. I was overjoyed as I sang praises to the Lord. The ride back was a pleasure and a relief.

         Helen is now home with her family, cooks for them, and even goes to the movies and stores with them. She has accepted the Lord and I’m trusting Him to continue the work in her that He has begun. There is still much to be done in her and in her family as well.

         Since Helen, the Lord has placed me in several situations to deal with demonic powers. Demons are lying spirits, that nevertheless can give important information to aid in the deliverance of their victims. Deliverance is truly bread for the children of God. When Jesus entered into the temple, He cast out the unclean things. We become the temple of the Holy Spirit when we receive Jesus as Savior and should expect the Lord to cleanse us not only spiritually, but in every way needed. Spirit filled Christians can and do have demonic problems. In varying degrees, we all have to humble ourselves before the Lord and seek the many deliverances He knows we have need of. I have seen the difference deliverance has made in my life. I, myself, was saved and spirit filled and delivered from a spirit of Mariolatry. It’s from my personal experience that I testify. Wherever Jesus went, He healed the sick and cast out demons. He told us we were to do the same in His Name. I’ve learned a great deal and I know the Lord will continue to give the wisdom, guidance and instructions to use the authority to do spiritual battle according to Ephesians, Chapter 6 verses 11 to 18.

         Prior to 1986 I began having pain and a bloody show which ranged from a heavy flow to spotting on a daily basis. I went for prayer and fully expected the Lord to heal me as He had done so often in the past. After a year and a half I went to a doctor and he diagnosed a fibroid tumor and we elected to do nothing in the hope that menopause would take care of the problem naturally. The pain and the bleeding increased during the following six months and I began feeling weak. Sucking continuously on ice cubes seemed to help. I came to a point that I was so weak that it was an effort to lift my arm. Dragging myself to the doctor’s office, finally, took all my strength. The nurse asked me if I wanted to lie down when I arrived. It was a warm day, but I began to shiver. The doctor came in and within minutes they were calling my family and an ambulance to take me to the hospital. At the hospital they were alarmed at my low blood count and gave me three pints of blood. Although I had a high temperature I couldn’t get warm. I was in pain and all energy seemed to be drained from my body. During the night I could hear the doctors talking about me outside the door. They didn’t feel the fibroid tumor was responsible for my condition and they didn’t know what to do next since there was no response with all they had tried. They agreed that operating to remove the tumor was out of the question in my weakened state, anyway. Even to hold a conversation required more energy than I had. Truly, I felt drained to the point of death. I began to believe that the Lord was going to take me that very night and I just prayed for His will to be done. There was no fight in me and I had this odd sensation that there was a large hole where my stomach and back should be. The next 24 hours slipped by and I was actually surprised that I was still alive the following morning. The next two days I remained very weak and slowly strength began coming back. They kept me for almost a week and gave me iron tablets to take in preparation for a planned hysterectomy the following month.

         Am I really going to have to have an operation down the road, I wondered. As I continued to have the same symptoms, I decided to go to the library and find out some facts concerning hysterectomies. Armed with some information, I was able to insist that my ovaries were not to be removed unless they were found to be diseased, despite the protests of the doctor.

         In the interim, I continued getting prayer in the hope of receiving healing without going the medical route. A visiting minister, Brother Ivory Hopkins, prayed for me in a prayer line. After he prayed for me, I proceeded to walk away when I heard this loud high-pitched wailing screech. Turning quickly to see what was happening, I was shocked to realize that the screech I heard came out of my very own mouth. Brother Ivory and deliverance workers prayed for me and I was delivered from a spirit of death that night.

         Surely I wouldn’t need an operation after that, I thought. But that wasn’t the way things began to go. I continued to have pain and began to bleed even heavier. They put me in the hospital and operated on me July 2^nd 1986. It was painful and uncomfortable for the first week, but I was grateful that God brought me through it and that it was over. Just when we figure out how God is going to do things, He comes along and does it another way. His ways are not our ways, but He gets the job done. To God be the glory!

         A recent special experience that I shared with a terrific team came about on Feb. 23^rd 1991. That was the day my girlfriend, Emily Scuderi, gave birth to her son, Benjamin Daniel. It was a home birth assisted by a midwife (Melanie), her assistant (Leona), Emily’s husband, Neil, young Neil and myself. The delivery became complicated as Benjamin’s head emerged and Emily was too exhausted to push. There was no sound from the baby and his face was blue. His shoulder was in a wedged position crimping the umbilical cord. This caused his blood supply and oxygen to be cut off, allowing only three minutes before brain damage could occur. An episiotomy was quickly performed and the mid-wife had to put her arm in the womb to twist the baby and pull him out. She used suction to clear his nose and throat, but still no sound. I prayed, Lord don’t let anything happen to this baby as I listened for his cry. It was a traumatic couple of moments for us all before Benjamin began to breathe, move slightly and color flowed through his body. I could have leaped for joy. The baby’s umbilical cord was cut, and he was given to me to bathe. Even during his bath he didn’t cry. He was just content to take everything in that was going on around him. Meanwhile Emily was being stitched, as Aunt Joan, cousin Sarah and Grandma and Grandpa arrived with Italian “goodies.” The next day Emily didn’t have any of the pain and discomfort she experienced with her first delivery, even though she had extensive tearing. Now she and the men in her life are continuing their family affair together. Natural birth is almost as exciting as the process of spiritual birth. Thank you Lord.

         February 23^rd 1991 was the same day that the Lord gave a double portion blessing when my friend, Margie Melito, gave birth to her son, Matthew. New birth is fascinating. I also witnessed my daughter, Theresa, giving birth to my granddaughter, AnnMarie in a hospital setting. To realize that the Lord forms us and knows us even in our mother’s womb is amazing. (Jeremiah, Chapter 1 verse 5). Then to be made aware that He wants us to know Him and communicate with Him is awe inspiring. And that’s only the beginning. If just looking upon one of His new creations is such a joy, I can’t wait to behold the Creator!!!

CHAPTER V11

HIS HEALING TOUCH IN PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS

         The most precious of the Lord’s healing touches have been between my husband and myself. Artie would come home from work at 11:00 P.M. and have his supper then. Local funeral homes in the area, who Artie worked for when he had his part-time limousine service, would call him from time to time to serve as a pall bearer. When Artie would come home, I would inform him that he had a “carry” the following morning. Very often I would get an annoyed response. Finally he said to me, “Do you have to hit me with that as soon as I get home? Why don’t you wait until after I’ve eaten and relaxed.” So from then on I would wait until after he had eaten and then tell him. Then I would get another angry response and he would holler at me for not telling him sooner so he could prepare himself for an early night in order to get up in the morning. Often, I would burst into tears. I went to the Lord to spill out my anger and the Holy Spirit instructed me to leave a note over the phone with all the information on it and not say a word. Artie was informed about the new procedure and it worked beautifully. Now when Artie came in, he would just look over the phone or wait until after supper as he chose. It was such a simple solution, but it took all the friction out of his home coming. After all, our lives consist mostly of the little things.

         Another time the Holy Spirit intervened, it was not quite so soft a touch. Artie is involved in our volunteer fire department and in the ambulance squad as well. Every Saturday night he had ambulance duty and every Sunday morning there were fire training drills. He came home just as I had to leave for church and he never chose to join me. Sunday night was the only time we had together because he worked so late during the work week. Even that was often interrupted by a fire call.

         This particular Sunday morning I was standing in front of the sink washing dishes in a frenzy. I told the Lord out loud that I was tired of feeling like a widow and what kind of marriage was this “one way street”? I don’t even feel like a married woman, I continued. Do you know that it’s been over three weeks since I’ve even slept with my husband? With that, the Holy Spirit said in an authoritative commanding voice, “Stop it, you’re acting like a bitch in heat”. I cringed under the impact. I felt as though a blow had struck me down in my spirit, but before I could crash down, the everlasting arms were under me to cushion my fall. I was both chastised and comforted at the same time. My flesh said that couldn’t be God. God doesn’t speak in that manner or use those words. But I knew it was God. I had been admonished by God and my attitude had to go and go it did. When I told my husband what had taken place, he laughingly said, “Even God is on my side”. From time to time that attitude has attempted to get a foothold in me again, but I’ve never let it happen.

         There was another time the Lord intervened and taught me submission through love. Artie had a union meeting in the city and I had gone to church to pick up the children after a weekend retreat. We had both arrived home about 6:00 P.M. equally tired. Everyone was hungry and I proceeded to put a fast meal of hamburgers out for everyone. My husband began to complain about not having our usual Sunday roast and kept it up. I finished what I had to do and went to bed and fitly cried myself to sleep at about 8:30 P.M. A few minutes before midnight, I awoke instantly alert, and the Lord spoke to my heart and said, “I want you to go out and make up with your husband before this day is over.” I said, “No, Lord, I’m not going to do it. Every time something goes wrong, I’m always the one who goes and makes up. This time I’m not going to do it. I’m right and he’s wrong.” I tried to lift myself from the bed and I couldn’t move. “Besides, I blurted out, I just don’t feel like making up with him.” Then the Lord spoke these words in such a compassionate way, “I didn’t feel like going to the cross; I went out of love.” My resistance just melted away for the most part and I was able to easily get up from my bed. What could I possibly answer to that?

         Artie was lying on the couch watching TV and he couldn’t care less about what had taken place earlier. I went over to him purely as an act of obedience and kissed him on the forehead and said, “I forgive you” and promptly tried to go back to bed. As I reached the bedroom door, Artie said, “If you really mean that you’ll lie down on the couch with me and watch the rest of this program.” I stood at the bedroom door for what seemed like two minutes, battling my will, and then returned to the couch. The movie was over in ten minutes or so and we went to bed. I gave Artie a quick peck on the cheek and promptly turned over still nursing my grudge. Suddenly, the Lord touched my heart and I began crying and the grudge melted. I had walked in obedience as I was able and the Lord did for me what I was unable to do for myself. Instinctively, I knew this was an act of God’s mercy towards me and from then on I was to walk in maturity so far as my emotions were concerned, on my own. Artie just gave me another one of those “way out” looks as I told him everything was alright now.

         Artie didn’t seem to have much use for emotions. I think he viewed any emotional outburst of mine as a sign of mental instability and weakness. I longed to communicate with him at a deeper level and just couldn’t reach him. Some friends of mine had gone to a marriage encounter weekend and spoke highly of it. They said it was for good marriages that wanted to get better. That sounded good to me. I asked Artie if we could go and he said “no way”. On faith, I sent a $10.00 deposit in and asked the Lord to change his mind. When the confirmation date arrived, I placed it over the phone planning to put it away. Artie saw it and in his usual strong manner, told me that we weren’t going. A few weeks later I had a baby shower at my house for one of the neighbors. Towards the end of the evening, the husband of one of the invited ladies came to pick her up and came in for coffee. He had recently been on a marriage encounter and couldn’t praise it enough. My husband was impressed by this big 6'4" Irishman. The next thing I know, he was telling one of his friends that we were going on a marriage encounter. He hadn’t said a word to me about it personally, though.

         The marriage encounter weekend seemed to make more of an impression on Artie than it did on me. Much of what they were trying to project were things the Lord had caused me to learn experimentally. Basically, that love is a decision and the emotions involved are a bonus and we are not to be led by them, but control them. That was pretty much what the Lord taught me when He said, “I didn’t feel like going to the cross; I went out of love.” The weekend allowed Artie to give me freedom to express myself and that was a big step forward for us. Up until that time, one of his favorite lines was “I don’t want to hear it.” He really tried to change.

         From the time I became a Christian, the Lord began to heal my wounded, bruised spirit and build up my self esteem. Artie and I always had a verbal ping-pong game going between ourselves. I usually came out the loser in the emotional area with Artie getting the last word. Now there was a difference, a spark of life, and the ability to laugh at the very things that once caused hurt. For instance, if he would snap at me, who do you think you are? I would be right back with “I’m the daughter of the King” (Jesus). One time I said to him, “if you won’t be quiet, I’ll step on you.” He replied, “You couldn’t reach that high.” With that I came back with, “Then I’ll get a ladder.” I could feel a wall evaporate between us in laughter. It was the Lord who put those words in my mouth and I heard them for the first time the same as Artie. Such remarks would have devastated me in times past.

         Another time my husband was going to work and I was in the kitchen with my girlfriend, Vicky. He got all ready for one of his witty departures and said “What are you going to do today? You don’t do anything around here.” With that, I came back with, “And aren’t you glad I don’t.” (We had been discussing a housewife prostitution scandal that had just been uncovered in an adjoining town and he knew I was referring to that). He went off to work grinning.

         The Lord taught me another lesson in submission and why some prayers seemingly go unanswered. Our oldest son, John, was graduating from school and he needed a suit jacket. The budget was tight and I asked the Lord to provide one for him. That Saturday, my husband and I were suppose to attend the wedding of one of his cousins. I was looking forward to talking to them about the Lord. That morning Artie told me he didn’t want to go to the wedding and suggested we visit out friends in Levittown. I was disappointed and could have pushed him to go, but I knew we would only end up having a miserable time. Kneeling by my bed, I asked the Lord to help me submit to my husband’s plan with a loving attitude. When we arrived at Tony and Gail’s house, she ushered me into the bedroom and there on the bed was a large box of clothing. Right on top was a beautiful jacket that fit John beautifully. I was so proud of him up on that stage the night he graduated. The Lord spoke to my heart and told me if I had chosen not to be in submission to my husband, I would have prevented Him from answering my prayer for the jacket. There are principles in God’s word that must be adhered to in order to obtain results. An added bonus would come into play years later as my daughters began to reap the benefit of my lessons in submission in their lives and marriages.

         Lots of little incidents come to my mind concerning the children, particularly in their teenage years. Michael was about fourteen years old and his time to be in the house was 9:00 P.M. About 9:00 P.M. he supposedly went to bed. I was in my bedroom praying. A short while later the Holy Spirit spoke to me and said, “Michael is not in the house.” Sure enough, when I went to his room he was gone. I drove around the neighborhood, didn’t find him, and went home to wait for him. Come 10:00 P.M. Michael walks upstairs (supposedly coming from his room) stretches his arms and rubs his eyes as though he just woke up. He put on a pretty good performance as I remember. “Where were you Michael?”, I boomed at him. He looked like I had just struck him. There wasn’t even a hint of denial. “I sneaked out of the house to be with my friends”, he said as he lowered his head like a beaten puppy dog. “How did you find out?”, he asked. The Holy Spirit told me, I answered. He watches every move any of you make. I may not be able to see, but He always can. The Lord is going to help me raise you all just as I asked Him to. Little did I realize the full truth of that statement.

         Our eldest son, John, was not mechanically inclined when he was younger. Theresa, our oldest daughter, was dating a boy named Bobby, whom she would later marry. Bobby would occasionally work with my husband on car repairs. While John wasn’t interested in these things, it was still a slight point of contention. One day my husband was painting the outside of the house. John and Bobby were sitting at the kitchen table. Slightly annoyed at having to tell John to do it, I said to him, “Why don’t you get outside and help your father do the painting?” John came back with “Why don’t you ask Bobby to do it. He does everything so great.” My fleshly nature wanted to pull him by “his shoulder length hair” but the Holy Spirit spoke through me and I heard myself say “Since Bobby does things so great, you’re the one who needs the practice.” Something was broken in the air as a quick grin flashed between them. Arms over each other’s shoulders, they both went to join my husband in the painting project.

         There was another time when I was laying down the ground rules for Theresa and Bobby’s dating. Bobby ran out of the house shouting at me “You just don’t want me dating your daughter.” The Lord had me write him a note and add the little code that they had between them “1 4 3". It stood for I love you. It took care of all the ruffled feathers between us and I felt as though I gained another son.

         When John graduated high school, he joined the Air Force and was stationed in Louisiana. He took an apartment off base, so we were able to call each other whenever we chose. One night I had a strong urge to call him immediately. We talked for a little while and it was a common practice of mine to pray for him in tongues before saying goodbye. Later, I was to learn from him that he had a group of people over who had a very free life style that John wasn’t even trying to resist. John told me he became so convicted when I began to pray in tongues, that he turned his face towards the wall. When he had turned around again, his friends had their coats on walking out the door.

         Indeed there was much reason to keep John in prayer. Around Thanksgiving of that year, he told me he met a girl that he liked. Early Christmas Eve, John called and said, “What would you say if I told you I was thinking of living with this girl?” The thought crushed me and I told him I didn’t think much of it. He replied, he was only kidding, but I knew he was serious. Following the call, I went into the bedroom where I poured out my heart to the Lord. The Holy Spirit had me write an eight page letter to them. John later brought the letter back to me because I couldn’t even remember what I had wrote, other than to remind him he was a son of the Lord Jesus Christ and such conduct was beneath him. The girl he was referring to was Janet and she was 18 years old. John told me that when he and Janet read the letter, they both cried and decided to be married. Things were a little more complex than that, though. Janet had a 20 month old daughter who was fathered by a black boy and her parents had begun the process of legally adopting her. John didn’t know if our family would be able to accept this. We, on the other hand didn’t know if John were mature enough to handle the situation responsibly.

         Much prayer went up before the Lord for His perfect will by Christian friends and myself. On January 22^nd, they were involved in the car accident that I wrote about in detail earlier. They flew up here in the middle of February for us to meet. There were just telephone conversations prior to then. Janet was a lovely girl and the visit went well. They were married on March 4^th in Louisiana by a Pentecostal minister with Janet’s parents and a few close friends present. While I didn’t say or do anything to interfere with the adoption plans, I did talk to the Lord. “Lord”, I prayed, “I know Christina should be with her mother and be a part of the Sears family.” The next I heard was that John and Janet had decided to bring Christina (Tina) home with them. John went through the whole adoption procedure and Christina officially became a Sears. Tears of joy filled me at the good news. I was not only a mother-in-law, but a grandma as well.

         The 15^th of May they had a regular church ceremony and reception that followed. My husband made up an album that said “The Wedding of John, Janet and Tina.” That’s what everyone called her as a baby. We took movie film of her dancing at the reception as small as she was.

         It amazes me as I look back and see how the Lord began to prepare us for Christina in His own special loving way. Before John and Janet had met, Artie and I had filed an application to adopt either one or two children from El Salvador. We had gone through the whole procedure with the immigration authorities. During our last interview a woman questioned us as to whether a boy or girl was important to us. We said it didn’t matter and would even consider a brother and sister. Then she said, many of the orphans have been fathered by black men and would an interracial background be acceptable to us. We had never given it a thought before and we agreed it didn’t matter. Next thing we knew there was an earthquake in El Salvador and we received a letter that all adoption procedures had been canceled. Soon after Christina came into our lives.

             Christina was a beautiful flower girl at my daughter Theresa’s wedding. She now has two brothers, Sean and Jimmy and a sister named Erica. (For an update at this point in time, Christina is a beautiful sixteen year old who does well in school, enjoys her dancing recitals and dating Spencer).

         When their children were small, John and Janet came for a visit and had just driven back to Louisiana. John called me on the phone and broke into a sob and kept saying, “He’s dead. He’s dead.” All I could think of was my grandson, Sean, who had just had a bout with pneumonia and bronchitis. “Who’s dead?”, I asked excitedly. Through words interrupted by deep sobs, John told me that a good friend of his had been killed in an automobile accident. They received the news when they got home. John continued, “All the times he sat in my living room and I never spoke to him about the Lord. All the chances I had. Now he could be in hell. If only I had told him.” (At that point in time I didn’t understand God’s reconciliation plan).

         There were no words that could comfort him. That experience made a big difference in John. He and another Christian began a small bible study on the base soon after that. Tapes and books went back and forth between us. I noticed a deeper interest in the things of God as he began to tithe and read the Bible and Christian books.

         When our oldest daughter, Theresa, was about ten, we were advised to get her braces. The dentist wanted $200 to start and $25 a month to do the work. We just couldn’t do it. My mother sent me a letter with $200 to get the work started, although I had never asked her to. Even keeping up with the $25 to the dentist each month was a tremendous chore and we fell behind often. I had understood the money to be a gift to Theresa from my mother, or I would never have accepted it knowing our financial state. The following four years were rough and then they began to smooth out. We even had to cash in our life insurance policy in order to keep from losing the house.

         Whenever I would get a washing machine or Artie would get another used car or anything in the house, my mother would comment sharply about it. She was rarely happy for us at those times. Sometimes, I would feel as though tiny darts were directed towards me and it would leave me feeling down. I would think her drinking was responsible for her disposition then.

         Years later, Artie and I were in the kitchen discussing a bill. I heard my mother mutter something under her breath about $200. I know it was the Holy Spirit who caused me to hear it because in my ear it sounded like a trumpet alerting me. Quickly, I picked up on it and asked what $200 are you talking about? She said, you borrowed $200 from me and never paid it back. There was a time Artie had borrowed $200 for a car repair, but we were both sure we had paid it back. He went looking through old check stubs and sure enough he found it. Finally, she said, the $200 I gave you for Theresa’s braces is what I’m talking about. I felt as if a great weight was lifted from my back when that was exposed. “That was what it was all about. Why didn’t you tell me before this? Why did you let it go on for so long?”, I shouted.

         Artie had to leave for work and my mother left with him to go home. I could feel the rage well up within me. How could she have done that to me for so long? How could she be so cruel? I feel like paying her the money and never laying eyes on her again. With that the Holy Spirit gave me discernment and caused me to see the real enemy, who is Satan. A wave of compassion for my mother came over me. Not only had Satan and his demonic powers manipulated my mother for so long, but now were trying to attack me as well. The agony that my mother must have endured under this oppression! I took authority over these forces in the Name of Jesus and I knew this whole thing was conquered. Alleluia!!! Artie worked overtime and we paid my mother her money back very quickly and I learned to confront her immediately as little issues came up in the future. One of the more serious confrontations would deal with her drinking. As Christians we don’t have to sit back and take what Satan wants to throw our way. Jesus has already defeated Satan for us. Our job is to keep him in his place which is under our feet.

         Speaking about oppression recalls another time about a year after being baptized in the Holy Spirit. I didn’t know much about Satanic attacks. For a full two week period I thought I was in the process of losing my mind. It was as though molasses had been poured over my brain and everything I did was by slow motion. I must go to the refrigerator; I must open it up; I must reach inside, etc. It was impossible for me to think of anything in advance. Motion by motion was the only way I was able to function. “Lord, what is happening to me? What will everyone think if I lose control? How can this be happening if I have the mind of Christ?” The pressure was tremendous as I told myself to hold on, tomorrow it will lift. Time moved so slowly and hope began to leave me as the oppression continued to hang over me morning after morning; day after day. Vaguely, I remember a time years before when, for a period of two months, I felt a constant gloom over me. While watching Carol Burnett go through one of her TV skits, I broke out in a fit of laughter and felt the gloom lift. Still, it was nothing like this molasses state I was in. Standing in front of the kitchen sink “my anointed sink”, I spoke to the Lord. “Lord, I don’t know what’s going on. Perhaps you want me in Central Islip, (a mental institution near us) to use me in a way I don’t understand. I just want you to know I’m willing.” With that the invisible bond around my mind was cut loose and I was fine again. That experience worked a compassion into me that would enable me to minister to those who were undergoing mental battles. The Lord does deliver when we wait upon Him.

             In October of 1978 my mother-in-law had a stroke. She was brought from the Bronx to a hospital near our home. My sister-in-law, Kathleen, moved in with us and we stored their furniture in the garage and house. Kathleen was 48 years old then, but she had the emotional and mental maturity of a young teenager. The following year was one of many adjustments on the part of us all. There were boxes of religious paraphernalia and statues of saints that I just couldn’t bear to have come in the house. After the Lord had shown me His view on these icons I refused to walk in disobedience. Much of it came in just the same. The Lord, however, was faithful in keeping our home spiritually clean. There was a large framed painting that the Lord gave me discernment about. To the natural eye there was nothing even remotely religious about it. I began to take the picture out of its frame and discovered a picture of St. Theresa concealed beneath the painting. Then the Lord directed me to destroy two bracelets that had little charms of the ten commandments. I questioned myself as to whether this was the Holy Spirit. Being convinced in my spirit that it was, I obeyed. It wasn’t long before the Lord would show me that the bracelets contained the ten commandments of the Catholic Church rather than His Word. They leave out the second commandment of God which is; Thou shalt not make any graven images, nor bow down to worship and serve them; and they substitute; Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain. The tenth commandment is; Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife or goods; but the Catholic Church makes that into the ninth and tenth commandments.

         Kathleen would continually nit pick at the garbage and bring back the things I threw out, even if they were mine. The greasy spoons and dishes always had to be washed again. I would open the dish closet and plates would literally fall on me. She loved to do the laundry. It made no difference to her if the white clothes were washed with the dark clothes, either. If there wasn’t any wash to do, she would find some, or make some. She faithfully followed her routine. The Lord would teach me in time that she did not have to measure up to my expectations of her. In time I would be able to accept her ways and even learn to appreciate her. Kathleen’s tantrums and arguments with my daughters were the hardest to take. If I corrected her she would raise her hands to me and shriek like a mad woman. While I never had any fear of her, the scenes were upsetting. She has now come a long way and enjoys going to a local Christian fellowship. Often she will wake up in the morning singing songs of praise to the Lord.

         While in the hospital my mother-in-law must have suffered another minor stroke and a specialist was called in. Up until then they were mainly concerned with treating her for diabetes. She grew worse and the doctors said she would need constant care and suggested a nursing home. In an attempt to see how alert my mother-in-law was, Dr. Lipton asked her how many grandchildren she had. She smiled and said six. He looked at me and jokingly said “You should have another baby” as he walked out. Two weeks went by and the hospital began giving us instructions so far as diet and medication went and how my mother-in-law was to be continually turned. She already had bed sores and the healing process was extremely slow. I began to have doubts about whether I could handle my mother-in-law’s needs, Kathleen and my own family as well. What bothered me most was not being sure if this was God’s will for me. The Lord gave me a word from my paraphrased bible from the book of Daniel chapter 10 verse 19, “Don’t be afraid, calm yourself, be strong-yes strong!!!” I badly needed that word in that moment.

         By this time I was coordinator of Fish of Farmingville and it consumed much of my time. Was I suppose to stop everything I was doing?

         The following Sunday morning while I was showering, the Lord brought Dr. Lipton’s face vividly before me and I heard him say as he did in the hospital “You should have another baby.” Lord, am I going to have another baby? Then the Lord spoke to me and said, “Your mother-in-law is the baby I’m sending you.” There was no doubt about what God’s will for me was then. The Lord also gave me a scripture to confirm it in Ecclesiastes chapter 2 verse 24...this also I saw, that it was from the hand of God.” The Lord always prepares us for what we are to do in one way or another.

         That very day, in the middle of our church service, I was given the telephone message from my family that my mother-in-law was being released from the hospital and would be waiting for me when I got home. True to the Lord’s Word “my baby” had arrived. The following morning I had to run out for baby food, adult diapers, baby powder and oil.

         The enormity of the job ahead began to dawn on me. My mother-in-law was completely paralyzed on her left side and only had the use of her right arm and leg. She had to be encouraged in even using them. There was no control over her bladder or bowels. The wash was never ending in an effort to keep her dry and prevent the break down of skin tissue. We had a hospital bed and even tried to use a hoist to lift her out of bed to take care of the bedding or lift her into a chair. She had lost a lot of weight...but was still a big woman and it was all dead weight. It was alright that first night when my husband was there, but when he left for work at noon time, panic gripped me. I sat at the kitchen table and prayed. It was as though the Lord put His arms around me and said do what you know to do and it will work out. Getting myself together, I made up a chart for scheduling her medication and prepared a menu for the foods she was allowed. Realizing I couldn’t lift her, I concentrated on keeping her turned and used wrap-a-round terry cloth dresses so it would be easier to keep her constantly changed. I taught Kathleen how to feed Mom, but always had to watch over her as she was too quick to force more food than Mom could handle. We were into a routine of sorts. Days ran into nights. Typical of a baby, mom would wake up every two to three hours during the night. Sometimes she would keep us up all night forgetting what she even called for or that we had just been in to her. Finally, Artie hooked up a buzzer for her to keep her from losing her voice. She would always thank and praise us.

         When the visiting nurse came a week later, she was quick to recommend a catheter. That took a great burden from us. I asked permission to be taught how to insert and irrigate the catheter in the event of a snow storm or other emergency. That training came in handy on several occasions. Still, I was pretty nervous the first time I had to do it on my own.

         There was physical improvement in my mother-in-law and she became more alert. A teenager in the neighborhood, Janis, was a God- send to me. She would help me lift my mother-in-law from the bed to the wheelchair and back. Kathleen, later learned to help as well, when Artie wasn’t home. Slowly, everyone in the family got into the act as Michael, Kevin, Keith, Theresa and Pat took turns. Even Bobby and Freddy, my two future sons-in-law got involved. The compassion and patience of my family impressed me, particularly in my moments of impatience. Kathleen would often stir up a problem with a few of the teenagers in the neighborhood and then dump a distorted version of it upon her mother and upset her. Those were disturbing times.

         That Christmas, my younger daughter, Patricia, became engaged and an August wedding was planned. My mother-in-law became increasingly demanding of even more attention about that time. She was wearing us all out. I noticed Kathleen becoming more co-operative and the tantrums lessened as my mother-in-law kept her hopping. Kathleen even began to lose some extra weight as a bonus.

         In April we put Mom in St. Charles Hospital for two weeks of rehabilitation. She was unresponsive and tried their patience. The weather was now getting warmer and we began to put her out on the porch in her wheelchair. No sooner was she out and she wanted to come back in. Once inside, she wanted to go back out. This went on whether she was in bed or in the living room. Then she would begin to wail and scream to get her way. Some days were better than others.

         A surprise bridal shower in our back yard was planned for Pat. I asked the Lord to keep my mother-in-law from spoiling the day. Ten days before the shower the doctor put her in the hospital because of fluid in her lungs. The shower went beautifully and right in the middle of it we got a telegram that we were to pick up my mother-in-law the following morning at 9:00 A.M. The Lord was so good and allowed us just enough time to do what we had to. He never gives us more than we can bear.

         Towards the middle of July, Mom was once again placed in the hospital. This time they had to amputate her left leg because of the advanced stage of diabetes. We brought her home on a Sunday and she had the opportunity to hold her two great grandsons, Sean and Jimmy, the youngest being a month old. She seemed to be recovering well. Wednesday night she kept calling my name over and over again, but there was no response when I answered her. She fell off to sleep and early Thursday morning began to call my name again. Still no response. My husband kissed her good-bye and went to take our son, Kevin, for his road test. Artie and I had decided to have the doctor come in when he returned. Mom again began calling my name “Mary, Mary”, over and over again. She had done the same thing when she was in the hospital. The nurses said she drove them crazy calling for me. I don’t know why, but this time I began singing “Mary had a little lamb...” to her. She shocked me by starting to sing the song herself, with a sweet smile on her face. Within moments she breathed her last breath. It was a very peaceful passing from us into the Presence of God. Mom had accepted Jesus as her personal Savior two years before and would listen to the bible stories and songs on the Christian radio station for hours at a time, sometimes into the wee hours of the morning. I remember how tormented she use to be at the thought of death before I told her there was no such place as Purgatory. We had the opportunity to discuss the love of God and that God was not trying to punish her for having married a divorced man. It gave her such comfort once she understood that. Now she was with the Lord. We were all at peace.

         Like pieces of a puzzle, the Lord fitted all the circumstances into place in His perfect timing. The date Mom died was August 2^nd 1979. It was the 15^th birthday of our youngest son, Keith. Three weeks later, on the 25^th of August, our daughter, Patricia, became Mrs. Frederick Keller and it was a beautiful occasion. Artie was so proud as he gave her away. Here was the daughter that survived being severely scalded at 17 months old walking down the aisle to begin the next phase of her life. God’s healing touch had brought her through and several years later she would overcome many obstacles in order to become a police officer and then a detective. Alleluia!!!

         Throughout the coming years, I would be involved in the care and responsibility of my grandchildren as their parents worked. At various times my children lived with us as they saved for their own homes. My husband and sons made our garage into a kitchen, added an entrance and downstairs became the kid’s place. A good support system was developed to meet the need of the moment. Along with it were the moments of chaos and stress that real life brings. (Just as I’m typing this, one of my sons called to pray with me for a friend. If they haven’t learned anything else, they know that there is a God who hears and answers us in our time of need). These were lessons we wouldn’t have learned had it not been for the struggles and pain. Compassion and the desire to reach out to people is a trait that I’m grateful is being worked into my children’s lives.

         In 1985 my mother moved in with us. She had difficulty living with my brother, Frank, who was having serious mental problems. There was a very real possibility that he would be thrown out on the street through no fault of his own. There was absolutely no room for him in our house. At this point in time, my married children were living downstairs with their children and my mother and sister-in-law lived with us upstairs. Our son, Kevin, had given up his room to my mother and was now sleeping on the couch. With the help of my son, John, I went before social workers, judges and doctors to get Frank the help he needed. I wrote letters explaining his situation and the fact that he was a big man, 6'4" and well over 250 pounds, and that he needed his own space. The Lord gave wisdom to do just the right things at the right time. I prayed that the Lord would make a way where there didn’t seem to be a way. We had Frank transferred from a mental hospital in the Bronx to one out here so that I could keep in close personal contact with him. Then I heard about a new program called ADD (Aid to the developmentally disabled). Papers were filled out and in the course of time Frank came to live in one of their group homes in Hampton Bays, Long Island. He now has the opportunity for social interaction and is free to visit us whenever we want. I thank God for this program and the help he receives. God made a way far above what I could have asked.

         The thought of Frank not being settled and cared for had disturbed me greatly. My thoughts were drawn back to the time when we were about 8 or 9 years old. I was doing my homework and Frank wanted to play. He kept pulling my pigtails to get my attention. There was a broken doll leg beside me. It was an old fashion doll that connected with a type of fish hook. Being annoyed, I tossed the doll leg at him and to my horror the hook dug right into his leg. I was devastated and began crying, telling him how sorry I was. All he kept doing was patting my head to comfort me and telling me everything was alright. (All the while this fish hook is still embedded in his leg). He was so gentle.

         I can’t ever remember a time that my brothers or I ever stooled on one another or even tried to get one another into trouble. With our parents having so many problems, I guess it was just natural for us to watch out for one another.

         Meanwhile on the home front, the battles were continuing. My mother and sister-in-law were bickering and Artie and I were having our own problems because of my desire to go on missionary trips. I informed them all I wasn’t responsible for their happiness. It was a frustrating time for me. Again and again I would go to the Lord for peace.

         Things began working out after awhile. I observed the Lord’s unique way of bringing restoration back into my life. As a child, coming home from school to an empty house left a void in me. Now when I come home from work, my mother will greet me at the door and will usually have a salad all prepared for me. While she wasn’t able to be there for me as a child or when I had my children, she is there to help my grown children when the need arises, to baby sit, go shopping, or meet some need of the moment. It’s restoration God’s way and in His time.

         Then in June of 1989 we gave my mother a surprise 75^th birthday party. It was an opportunity for her and all her sisters to get together at one time; my mother (Rose); Aunt Vera; Aunt Anna; Aunt Elsie; and Aunt Edith. My mother got the chance to see cousins that she hadn’t seen in years. It also gave me the chance to see some of my cousins; Edie; Dorothy; Arthur and his wife Carol, and many second cousins. It was a special time for all of us.

         My son, John, was particularly pleased for the chance to hear them share some of the memories of the past. He has always been interested in the family tree and has managed to get everyone involved. I thank God that the day was perfect as well. It rained the entire week before the party and it was cold. The night prior to the party we had floods and had to pump out some of our basements. That always added to our chronic cesspool problem. John was up until 3:00 A.M. drying up his basement, but we managed to drag ourselves and everything else together to pull off the party. As soon as it stopped raining, Artie was outside cleaning the leaves and tree branches from the pool and the rest of us were drying up chairs and tables in an attempt to get things readied. My mother was so surprised. It was all worth it and over too soon.

         At present, I am doing private care for an 82 year old woman named Ruth. She said I brought her hope when I began taking care of her five years ago. It wasn’t long before she was taking care of me. She taught me about vitamins, introduced me to classical music, and taught me scrabble words that I had never heard of. Working for her allowed me the time off and the finances to travel on missionary trips. It wasn’t long before I referred to her as my other mother. I always told her if ever I believed in reincarnation (which I don’t) I would want to come back as her cat “Iffy”. She treats him like royalty and Iffy has “her” well trained. Ruth is going strong and is still very much my boss.

         The most recent experience with the Lord came about this past summer. My husband and my son, Kevin, built a half wall and added a wooden railing where the stairs lead up to our living room. I had told them to put old sheets down to prevent sawdust and spackle from getting into the rug and all over. They got involved with the cutting and measuring and didn’t bother. The next morning I started the clean-up and it took me all day to get the job done. I had been having problems with my arm and hands due to tendinitis and it just made the job seem more than it was. Anyway, as I was crawling on each of the steps I was groaning and moaning to the Lord that all of this wouldn’t be necessary if they had just listened to me and put the sheets down. Then I said to the Lord, I don’t like feeling like this and I forgive them in Jesus’ Name. Then the Lord spoke to me and said that if I had agreed with that attitude I would have given birth to a demon of bitterness in me. I pondered that for a long while. It gave new meaning to two scripture verses; Hebrews 12:15, Looking diligently less any man fail of the grace of God: LEST ANY ROOT OF BITTERNESS SPRINGING UP TROUBLE YOU, AND THEREBY MANY BE DEFILED. The second verse is James 1:15; Then, after desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.

         I had asked the Lord how to prevent further demonic activity from getting a hold in my life and He was faithful to teach me. Other lessons will undoubtedly follow. Hosea, chapter 4 verse 6 say: My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge...(not natural knowledge, but knowledge of the ways and protective wisdom of God).

CHAPTER VIII

YOU HAVEN’T SEEN ANYTHING YET

         Long ago, I was given a word that many souls would be brought to the Lord through the testimony of what the Lord did in my life. The book of Revelation says in chapter 12 verse11, that we overcome by the blood of the Lamb (Jesus) and by the word of our testimony (which is really how Jesus has moved in our lives). I use to complain to the Lord, I’m so tired of hearing my own testimony. It’s like a record over and over again. Can’t you give me a revelation from the Word that I can share with people? Aside from a very few incidents, the Lord didn’t do that and there was always my testimony. Anyhow, I am overcoming. I fall down on my face many times; but I get up and I’m overcoming.

         On July 28^th, 1977 I gave my testimony of what the Lord was then doing in my life, at Pinecrest, our church in Setauket, N.Y. Afterwards, the Pastor’s wife, Polly Sarvis, came up to me and told me I should write a book about it. The Lord had already spoken to me about that and this was confirmation; but I didn’t have the vaguest idea how to go about it. I made a feeble attempt and jotted down some sort of outline and promptly became involved in other activities with Fish and our church. On Feb. 26^th, 1978, the Lord gave me the name for the book and I committed it to Him. Still, I wasn’t able to press on with it. On April 26^th 1978 the Lord impressed Isaiah, chapter 30 verse 8 upon me; “Now go, write it before them in a table, and note it in a book, that it may be for the time to come, for ever and ever.” I sat at the kitchen table and made a few notations in a composition book and had to drop it again. So much was going on in the family and with my responsibilities in Fish. Next thing I knew my mother-in-law was sick and she and my sister-in-law, Kathleen, came to live with us.

         A few months later I joined a 3D group at our church. It stood for “Diet, Discipline, and Discipleship.” Part of the program was to ask God to work specific things out for us. I put down the memorization of the books of the bible in their order, as I have always had problems with my memory. The other thing I put down was help to write this book. For the first six sessions the Lord dealt with me in the diet and discipline area. Then He began to move upon my requests. He gave me a guide to memorize the bible books almost as a game. The following will show you what I mean.

There are 66 books in the Bible

39 in the Old Testament

(Jack Benny’s comical age)

27 in the New Testament

(Matthew, the first book has 7 letters)

  1. Genesis         G    Go

  2. Exodus          E Eat            or      (Gel)

  3. Leviticus        L     Lettuce

  4. Numbers N      New          or       No

  5. Deuteronomy D      Deal                    Deal

  6. Joshua J Joshua                 John 

  7. Judges J Judges or Jumps

  8. Ruth               R Ruth Rope

  9. 1 Samuel S Samuel      D Some

10. 11 Samuel   S O

                                                        U

11. 1 Kings K Kings B Kids

12. 11 Kings K (Checkers) L

                                                        E

13. 1 Chronicles Chronicles Cook

14. 11 Chronicles

15. Ezra           E Easy  

16. Nehemiah N or Extra news

17. Esther E Easter

18. Job J Job

19. Psalms Pretty

20. Proverbs P Perfect

21. Ecclesiastes Excellent

22. Song of Solomon Songs

23. Isaiah In

24. Jeremiah Jersey

25. Lamentations L

26. Ezekiel E Led

27. Daniel                               D (by)

28. Hosea Hope

29. Joel Joy

30. Amos And

31. Obadiah Obedience

32. Jonah Join

33. Micah My

34. Nahum Neighborhood

35. Habakkuk Heavenly Lion will lay

36. Zephaniah Zoo down

37. Haggai Heavenly with

38. Zechariah Zoo the lamb

39. Malachi Mail

Genesis to Malachi or G M for General Motors

NEW TESTAMENT

  1. Matthew

  2. Mark

  3. Luke

  4. John JAR

  5. Acts

  6. Romans

  7. 1 Corinthians (Two corners)

  8. 11 Corinthians

  9. Galatians General

10. Ephesians Electric

11. Philippians Phone

12. Colossians Company

13. 1 Thessalonians The (5) T’s

14. 11 Thessalonians Times finger

15. 1 Timothy Test

16. 11 Timothy Table tips on

17. Titus The hands

18. Philemon Pancake

19. Hebrews House

20. James (1) Jams

21. 1 Peter (2)

22. 11 Peter

P J’s (abbreviation for pajamas)

23. 1 John (3)

24. 11 John

25. 111 John

26. Jude (Jr. Abbreviation for junior)

27. Revelation

         The children in my Sunday class enjoyed this and I included some of the ones they liked best. 

         Next, the Lord led me to the Book of Job, chapter 19 verse 23 where the words literally jumped off the page at me; “Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were printed in a book”. He gave a word of command and I knew the Lord meant business. Then I realized that the date was April 26^th, 1979, exactly a year to the day that He gave me that same word from Isaiah. I always date my Bible beside the verse the Lord quickens to me. Still not knowing how to go about writing a book, I applied myself in earnest, trusting the Lord to bring it about.

         As I began jotting down some early childhood memories, my son John called, and I told him what I was doing. I hope you are putting down that incident when you babysat, he said. It was something I had completely forgotten about. Such incidents became common place as the Lord helped me to remember. He would later give me added help. (Far more than I ever could have imagined then). Only because of the Lord am I able to do anything. His touch is immeasurable in my life.

         In my kitchen hung a very special plaque given to me by my children. Carved on it are two large hands representing the hands of God. Upon the palms of His hands sits the tiny figure of a young girl. There is a flower bud carved on it and the words are from Isaiah chapter 49 verse 15 and 16; “I will never forget you...I have carved you upon the palms of my hands”. As soon as I saw it, it reminded me of the vision the Lord gave me when I received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit, a few years earlier. Even the flower bud had significance for me, because during a prayer meeting, a girl had asked us if we knew that the Lord has a new name for each of us? I closed my eyes and asked the Lord what my name was. The word “Marigold” popped into my head and I promptly dismissed it as being foolish. That’s the name of a flower, I said to myself. Upon arriving home, I opened my Bible to Isaiah, chapter 43 verse 1 and these words jumped up at me “Fear not, for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by name: thou art mine.” Later, I was to learn from another christian sister, Bonnie, who was not at the meeting, that God had given her the name of a flower as well, “Lilly”.

         Names are symbolic of our function or ministry in the church. I can remember my pastor praying for me at a service and the Lord showed me to him as being upon a wall using a machine gun to destroy the approaching enemy. Spiritually speaking, our prayer language is a weapon. That was exactly the way I would use my prayer language to pray for people. Then the Lord reminded me of the name that He had given me. I came to find out that marigolds are used as a defense system to protect gardens from insects. They possess a strong odor that repels destroying bugs. The scriptures refer to golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of the saints in Revelation chapter 5 verse 8.

         Always His Word was there to encourage me and to confirm what He was moving me into. I was anointed for service by a visiting minister at Pinecrest the very month the Lord called me to be coordinator of Fish. It definitely was not my idea. The Lord impressed me to make the commitment immediately. I had started out to do my food shopping and my mind wasn’t free to concentrate until I made the call. I had to stop at a public phone to tell the previous coordinator, Linda Grimaldi, I would accept the responsibility. Linda was so good at organizing, keeping records and remembering people and circumstances. I could never be as efficient as she was. Then the Lord gave me this from the paraphrased bible in I Chronicles, chapter 28 verse 21; “Be strong and courageous and get to work. Don’t be frightened by the size of the task, for the Lord my God is with you; He will not forsake you. He will see to it that everything is finished correctly. From verse 21, He added, “Others with skills of every kind will volunteer.” The Lord was so faithful to bring this to pass.

         The Lord also had me send my uniform in with a letter of resignation to the Women’s Auxiliary (connected with the fire department my husband was involved in) and instructed me not to put it off. Later I was to find out why. That year our FISH organization was invited to put a float together, lifting up Jesus, for the Memorial Day Parade. If I had still been in the auxiliary, I would have been obligated to march with the fire department as I had done in the past. The parade gave Pauline the opportunity to pass out salvation tracts as we marched through the center of Farmingville with this big heavy cross made out of 2' by 4's draped over by a white banner cloth with large red lettering on it. It had the Christian Fish symbol on it and the words “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Lord and Saviour.” It was heavy!!! At the last minute the Lord sent one of the men in Fish, Gary, to carry it. Thank you, Jesus.

         On the front of our float, we had a beautiful sign that Eddie Zabicki had made, from 11 Chronicles chapter 7 verse 14...”If my people will humble themselves and pray and search for me, and turn from their wicked ways, I will hear them from Heaven and forgive their sins and heal their land.” My future son-in-law, Freddie, drove the float for us.

         Prior to the time the Lord called me to be a Fish coordinator along with Bonnie, I had submitted two little poems to be used in our quarterly Fish newsletter. Little did I know that would be the first newsletter I would be responsible for. God is a great advance Man. These are the poems:

Where are the Fish?

“When you fish-you go where the Fish are”

         Fish people are on their knees in prayer

         Fish people are reading their bible

         Fish people are sharing the Good News of

                                  the Gospel

         Fish people are caring in love for the needs

         of others whether it be physical or spiritual

                  There is always a “fishing season”

for Fish people

Praise the Lord !!!

“My Word”

If you will but read

for 10 minutes each day

My Spirit will lead

And you will hear Me say

I’m opening many doors

I’ve gone to prepare a place

For you and yours

So run a good race

Till we meet face to face

                           This is another poem the Lord inspired.

Jesus has given the vision

We have made the decision

He gave the commission

That’s why we are “fish-in”

Jesus is the Head

By His Spirit we are led

He is our Heavenly Bread

By Him we are fed

                           Fish people, decide if you are in or out of

the “Living Water”

         Disturbed at the several hard words of correction the Lord had me give people, I went to the Lord. He gave me Isaiah 49 verse 2, “And He hath made my mouth like a sharp sword; in the shadow of His hand hath He hid me, and made me a polished shaft; in His quiver hath He hid me”. Then

I received a word of prophesy from a visiting minister “For the word of the Lord would come unto you and speak these words. Be thou courageous. Be thou bold. For I have given you a spirit not of timidity, but I have made you bold in my spirit. I have given you truth, and thou has worshipped me, and worshipped me well. I am pleased with thee. Thou art my faithful servant. I love thee and thy desire, yes, even is my desire. So shall it be done for you. Thus saith the Lord.”

         The desire of my heart at that point was for all my family to serve the Lord. I had told the Lord I don’t care what it takes to bring it about. Without even trying, I exerted considerable pressure upon my family to get serious about the Lord beyond the verbal commitment they had made. During a service I was called out of my seat and the visiting minister said “I see you struggling under the weight of a heavy wheelbarrow. You are pushing it in your own strength. The Lord says it is your family. You are trying to herd them like cattle under a whip. The Lord says you are to lead them as a shepherd leads sheep and just continue to look over your shoulder and you’ll see them come one by one. I’ve already seen that begin to happen.

         I praise God for the wisdom He has given me to instruct my children in the ways of the Lord. The havoc that results when children aren’t taught to avoid the various cults and occult practices are all too obvious. Our children aren’t being protected and they are wide open to demonic oppression. If truth isn’t imparted to them at an early age they can’t begin to protect themselves against the traps that await them. Rock music with its’ demonic beat, the occult with its’ ouija boards, astrology, dungeons and dragons, etc. are not the innocent games and pass times they are made out to be. The moral decay that goes unrestrained all around us shows we are doing little to protect the children or ourselves. God will call us to account for it.

         In February of 1979, I felt the need to be baptized in the Name of Jesus, in the same manner the apostles baptized in the book of Acts, chapter 10 verse 48 and in Acts 19 verse 5. By now I had an understanding of what it meant to be dead and buried to my way of doing things and alive in Christ and His moving in my life. Conscience Bay was located right behind our church. It was a Sunday night about 10:00 P.M. and the tide had just come in. Like a couple of polar bears, we broke through the ice and were baptized. Coming up out of the cold water the air felt like a warm breath upon us.

         On Sept. 2^nd of 1979, I was anointed for a Baptism of Fire. When the Lord gives you an anointing for something, you can be sure it will come to pass. I didn’t know what this anointing meant then. Now I understand it to be a burning and purging of all of my attitudes, reactions and responses that are contrary to the character of God. Our Heavenly Father is not out to make us perfect, but to perfect, in us, the nature or character of His Son Jesus Christ.

         This total commitment is a life long process. Emotional wounds, rejections, and loneliness at times, are all part of it.

                  Lord, take me and break me until I’m nothing

                  Melt me and mold me until I’m something

                  Then take me and use me for your glory

                  Until all that I am is you

         Pinecrest was my home church for eight years and I received invaluable teaching, rich ministry and some insight concerning the casting out of demons. During that time the Lord spoke to my heart and told me that I would be used in a deliverance ministry and minister to dark skinned people. At the time, I knew one black couple and thought that the deliverance ministry was a one man ministry. It didn’t make sense to me. The Lord had told me that my husband would be there with me, also. That seemed far fetched. My husband was less than enthusiastic about the things of God. Now I understand that the Lord was referring to Himself as my “spiritual husband.”

         Early in the year of 1981, the Lord placed an urgency in my heart to leave Pinecrest. It meant leaving my work in the Christian school as well as my Sunday school class before the term was completed. The Lord had to deal with me to be faithful and obedient to His will and not a position. He told me “Even this day I desire to pour my glory upon you.”

         It was a time of great confusion for me. For the next few weeks I searched unsuccessfully for a home church. Then I heard that there was a deliverance seminar at Queens College. The authors of some deliverance books I had read were to be the guest speakers; Win Worley and Frank Hammond. Along with some christian friends, I witnessed mass deliverance and demonic manifestation even as the Word of God was being taught. I was impressed and wanted more knowledge and practical experience.

         We learned that Win Worley would be speaking at a church called Gospel Revivals in Mt. Sinai and it was only twenty minutes away from my house. The pastor turned out to be a minister I had met briefly at a home meeting in Ronkonkoma a year or two earlier; Pastor Charles Holzhauser. Not only did I learn more about deliverance during that seminar, but the Lord gave me an assurance that this was indeed the very place He wanted me to be. The following years would prove this out.

         My friend, Hazel, joined me and the following year she married Peter Kimmerling, our favorite greeter at the church door. It wasn’t long before another friend, Vicky, started attending services and married Wayne.

         There was much deliverance in my mind taking place as the truth contained in God’s Word was delved into and examined in the light of other scriptures under the guidance of Pastor Holzhauser and other men of God. I had been exposed to some of these teachings before, but I was unable to receive them. Pastor Holzhauser had the ability to break down the Word of God so that we could receive it; much as a mother bird digests and passes nourishment on to her brood.

         The Catholic Church would be exposed along with her past and present history as the harlot spoken of in the Book of Revelation. An even deeper understanding of these scriptures would come later on. We would see the wisdom in God’s dietary laws and return to them. The rapture theory would be forever settled in my mind as not being scriptural.

         We would learn to put God’s Word into practice by binding the satanic forces all around us and loosing or executing the judgements of God against the host of hell. An understanding of how ancestral curses operated in our lives was revealed to us and we learned to break them and cancel out their objectives. Seminars on breaking evil soul ties and just how our souls have been fragmented and how to get them restored were priceless. Our homes would systematically be stripped of many articles that were displeasing in God’s sight such as the various “Jesus” pictures, carved images of all types, as well as personal items that the Holy Spirit convicted us of having soul ties to. Witchcraft curses and physic prayers would be uncovered and dealt with as the Holy Spirit gave insight to the church.

         We would learn how marriage breaking spirits and other demon spirits passed down through our blood line and worked as time bombs to destroy our lives and homes.

         Much knowledge and experience in casting out these demons was needed. We learned by doing, making mistakes, and by having a willingness to receive correction as well as rejection from other believers in order to do the works of God. Much prayer and fasting in the body equipped the church to discern the spirits that were operating against the believers. At times, the church looked like a battle field, as the demons cried out and began to swing violently as they were commanded to come out. Victories came and the lives of the people showed the results of being set free little by little.

         Christmas and other pagan celebrations would be dropped as the Lord drew us out of the Babylonian church and world systems. For my family it was a particularly trying time. They wanted to know if I was becoming a Jehovah Witness. That wasn’t what was happening, of course. I was simply beginning to walk in obedience as the Holy Spirit was giving the light, boldness and courage to do so. They blamed everything on the church I was attending, but that wasn’t true. I had the conviction in my heart concerning many of the man-made doctrines long before I ever came to the church. Only now I was beginning to walk them out in my everyday life. As hard as it is for them to understand, my family tries to be tolerant and supportive as the Lord continues to change me. I made it very clear to them that I was not expecting them to walk in the light that God gave me. God has His own time table for each of us. I freely speak the truth on any given subject and answer any question put to me and leave the rest to God. My prayer is that I have a teachable spirit and that I am faithful to remain open to the Spirit of God. I’m realizing the full implication of what the Lord means when He said, come out from among them, and be ye separate, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, in 11 Corinthians 6:17. God brings you out to bring you in...to something better.

         Pastor Holzhauser anointed me for ministry March 17, 1982; the beginning of a very full year. On June 1st I stopped taking the medication for epilepsy that I had taken for thirty years. I was learning not to totally depend upon the arm of flesh (doctors and medication) as I developed a trust in God for His divine healing and deliverance.

         In July, my husband and I left for Greece to visit our son, John, and his family. He was stationed at an Air Force Base and was involved in a bible study group that was quite serious about truth contained in the Word of God. One young man, in particular, obviously had a call on his life for ministry. I was surprised to find books that the Lord had used to open my eyes on several subjects there. They invited me to their prayer meeting which they held in their living quarters (off limits to women). Before I could enter the building, one of the men went in with a bell to clear the way for me. It made me laugh thinking back to my religious background and how the bell was always rung before the priest came out for mass. The men shared openly. Questions and answers went back and forth. I was asked to pray for several of them and broke family line curses that were operating in their lives. The Lord gave me discernment concerning one man in particular and he later testified that the Lord gave him deliverance. I was delighted with how the Lord moved and had no idea that this was just the beginning of ministry overseas.

         The Lord instructed me to lay myself (spiritually speaking) upon the altar on Oct. 29^th of 1983. I was reminded by the Lord continuously that He had given me a bold spirit and that I was to be courageous and that He was well pleased with me. Towards the end of November we were having a powerful deliverance seminar with a visiting minister, Win Worley. I was very active in helping to cast out the demons from the believers who came for ministry. This particular night, a demon speaking out of a believer, said to me, if you cast me out I’m going to get you. Ignoring this common remark we continued to bring deliverance. That night, November 28^th 1983 I had the most severe seizure I had ever had. My neck was injured to such a degree that it took eight months for it to heal. Bruises were all over my body and my face looked like a fighter who had just left a thirteen bout fight. I returned to the seminar the following night with the help of my friend, Vicky. Win Worley took one look at me and said that’s the work of witchcraft. I made it a point to cancel the works of demonic retaliation whenever I ministered deliverance in the future.

         The Lord assured me that He was in control and I refused to go back on medication. I also had the sense that the Lord delivered me from this spirit of epilepsy and that the violence I experienced was the spirit leaving me. This was to prove true as I have never had another seizure since. Not only have the seizures stopped, but there has been a continuous restoration and healing of my thinking processes and memory. Praise God.

         I’ve had people question me why I would hold on to God when various things happened to me. Truly, I can say I experienced the presence and comfort of the Lord that I never would have come to appreciate if it hadn’t been for these minor trials and tribulations. It taught me how to depend upon Him and trust Him no matter what the circumstances were. I also learned I was here to serve God, He was not here to serve me. My life was His and whatever His desire was, it was fine with me. He was doing the leading; I was doing the following. It certainly was a way I had never gone before and very definitely His way was not my own. He’s got the blueprint for our lives and it’s a waste of time and energy to try and get our lives perfect according to our values and standards. We jut can’t measure up to His standards. He is God!!!

         Next, the ongoing fulfillment of the Word of the Lord was put in motion. I didn’t even realize it at the time. The Lord had said that I would minister to dark skinned people. Half of our people at church were black and on Monday nights we went into Harlem to minister on a regular basis. As far as I was concerned, the Lord had already fulfilled His word to me.

         Gospel Revivals began a worldwide deliverance ministry. I supported the move, but didn’t think I was suppose to have any part in it, personally. It wasn’t until 1985 that the Lord stirred within me a desire to become involved. My husband didn’t like the idea, but he didn’t give me a hard time, mostly because he didn’t think I would ever go. I worked part time for my son-in-law, Bobby, and used the money to tithe and was saving the rest to publish the book that the Lord wanted me to write. I had the opportunity to do a lot of writing while in the office. The next trip that the church was planning was to England. When it came time to pay for the ticket, I had just what I needed. Up until the last minute my husband had expected me to back out. Out team went to England in August of 1985 for ten days.

         When we arrived in England, I was expecting to minister to mostly white people. When I saw that the whole congregation was black, the reality of the Word of the Lord dawned on me profoundly. Was there more to the Lord’s word of being in the deliverance ministry and ministering to people of dark skin?

         Arriving home from England, my husband met me at the airport. He had purchased a motor home while I was gone and we spent the next couple of days in Atlantic City. Both of us had found the time apart hard.

         The following year, February 1986, I went to minister in a place near Aruba for five days. When I called home, my husband refused to talk to me. This continued for two weeks after I returned. Is this what I should expect, Lord?

         There were several trips that the team made and I knew I wasn’t to join them. The following year, a 16 day trip to India wa planned leaving Feb. 10^th 1987. I knew I was suppose to go. My husband refused to even discuss it. For two months our everyday life was strained. Lord, why is this such a difficult time if this is your will, I lamented. My husband was quick to bring up scriptures about how a wife is suppose to be in submission to her husband. He even had me make an appointment for us to discuss the matter with my pastor. When I questioned the Lord as to how I was to walk in submission to Him and my husband as well, He caused a christian newsletter to come in the mail at just that precise time. The newsletter was about Abigail, the wife of an evil man in 1 Samuel chapter 25. She fed David and his army against the wishes of her husband and was responsible for avoiding their slaughter. Then it went on about how Sapphira conspired with her husband, Ananias, to deceive the apostles and God killed them. It opened my eyes to ungodly submission and caused me to be at peace obeying the Lord. My husband continued to be difficult to the point of taking my money and passport. He finally relented and returned them to me.

         In Madras, India, we attended a wedding within hours of our arrival. The bride looked frightened. Unknown to me, it was an arranged marriage and the couple, Lydia and Gideon, had never laid eyes on one another. I spoke to them through an interpreter, smiled and took their pictures, placing Gideon’s arm upon his wife’s shoulder. I told Lydia how lovely she looked in her beautiful sarai (material draped into a skirt and head covering). They appeared at ease and smiled spontaneously. A few days later they presented me with an elegant blue print sarai as a gift. It was a very touching gesture that moved me deeply.

         Pastor Stephen Devakumar and his wife, Bekky, were our sponsors in India. They were warm gentle people truly blessed with a servant’s heart. Despite the crowds, smells, sickness and overwhelming poverty, I found India to be fascinating and ministering to the people a joy. Knowing it was fulfillment of the Lord’s word only made it more precious.

         Returning home, the cold war continued to come from my husband. It was very difficult on the entire family. The tension would let up after a few week, but it was emotionally draining.

         The following year a second trip to India was planned for February 1988. As always the Lord provided the finances needed by giving me extra hours as a home health aide. This time I didn’t even tell my husband way in advance. After notifying my husband that I would be going back to India, I realized that he had taken my passport and wouldn’t return it. I told the Lord that it was up to Him to soften my husband’s heart. It wasn’t happening. The very last night before I would have to attempt togo into the city and obtain a new passport, the Lord moved in a sovereign way. I had been praying and I picked up a christian newsletter that said the Lord will speak to you. With that, the Lord spoke to my heart and said “Mary, your passport is in Artie’s car in his briefcase.” It was cold out and I was in my night clothes and barefoot, as I quickly ran out to the car. Artie usually keeps his car locked and his briefcase as well. To my delight the car door was unlocked and with my heart pounding I opened his briefcase and beneath his papers I found my passport. For a moment I just stared at it in disbelief. I felt awed and a deep sense of relief as I realized that I was in the will of God and He had made a way for me.

         Upon returning to India, we found Lydia had given birth to a baby girl. The baby wa dedicated while we were there and they named her Mary Sears. I felt very honored. The Lord further impressed upon me that this was the last time I would be in India.

         Back home the turmoil continued. It was going on for about two months. I realized I was heading for an emotional breakdown when I started sobbing uncontrollably while driving home from work on the expressway. This retaliation and control was more than I could handle. I told Artie I was going for a divorce. After an unsuccessful attempt to find a lawyer, Artie said maybe the Lord doesn’t want us to get a divorce. At that point, both of us just wanted some peace restored in the house.

         Two years later a trip to Nigeria was scheduled for ten days in April 1990. Are we going to have to go through this whole thing all over again, Lord? Is it worth it all? In my heart I knew I had to take a stand. I also knew I couldn’t live under any ungodly domination or unreasonable fears that Artie had. To be separated for two weeks out of a year or two was not the end of the world. The control issue was very much the problem.

         We found Nigeria in the midst of revival and open to God’s deliverance power. Pastor Reuben Chizor, his brother Stephen, and so many more were very warm and hospitable to us. Reuben was a young man with a heart warming smile and sense of humor. We teased him about when he was going to get married. (On the next trip to Nigeria, Marie, a girl from our church went along. Marie and Reuben met and began corresponding with one another and then on December 7^th 1991 they married in Nigeria in a traditional African ceremony.

         Coming home from Nigeria, the cold war was well under way. This time I was handling it fairly well. Artie wasn’t. I didn’t know what to do. Remembering the inner turmoil I had endured gave me compassion towards Artie. He wanted me to say there would never be any more trips. I felt that was not my choice to make. Seeing Artie’s pain and knowing he was without the comfort of the Holy Spirit to support him, brought me to a decision. I told him I would not make any more trips, but I emphasized that I was not yielding out of weakness or guilt, but simply because it was obvious he couldn’t handle it. There was no sense of disappointment or resentment on my part as I had expected. I felt that part of my walk with God was fulfilled and God was moving in a different direction in my life now.

         The Lord was again impressing me to get on with the book. A few months earlier I had searched unsuccessfully for the up-to-date manuscript I had worked on. Three years had gone by since I last worked on it. The Lord impressed me to go on a fast on June 21^st 1989. Two days later I received my manuscript in the mail and it was dated June 21^st. I had given it to a sister in the Lord to read through three years before and both she and I thought she had returned it. Sheila Vitale was cleaning out a drawer the very day the Lord had me to fast and found it. She would later suggest that I type my book on a computer and initially set it up with helpful editing several years later. It was a thought that had never occurred to me.

         Then my husband presented me with a computer and printer as an anniversary and birthday present on Sept. 15^th 1991. I was overwhelmed and had no idea how to go about using it. My husband began to tackle the job head on. John, my oldest son, began showing him how to do things on it and soon my husband had it set up for me to do my book. Next thing I knew he was making birthday cards on it and family calendars with fancy designs. I, on the other hand was not so quick in overcoming the many obstacles. Twice I wiped out the entire floppy disk. Another time my mother turned off the light in the computer room wiping out that days work because the switch was connected to the computer controls. There were lots of frustrating days as I struggled through. Thank God my husband made up backup disks so that we didn’t always have to go back to square one. As I watched Artie work on the computer the Lord brought back to me His words that Artie would be with me in the deliverance ministry. I wouldn’t have been able to do this book, that the Lord said would bring deliverance, without him. My husband...the mixed blessing. There were times I didn’t know whether to love him or hate him. He always told me I wouldn’t be where I am if it weren’t for him. (I would always add...there to bug me.) Slowly I’m learning to just let God be God as He puts my life together as He sees fit, in His own time.

         Lord, I began to pray, why is this book so important? I don’t have any illusions that this is a great literary accomplishment and I know that you’ve done for many others what you’ve done for me. The Lord began to speak to me that He was the Shepherd and that I was one of His sheep whom He has prepared to hear His voice. This book was as a sheepskin, and He was exposing my flesh in much the same way as a shepherd shears His sheep, to bring comfort and blessing to many. The word sheepskin is defined as a passport or a writing usually under a seal conferring some honor or privilege. The Lord is awesome.

         The experiences I’ve been allowed to write about are few and far apart when you consider the span of years it covers. (I hope the interweaving of events weren’t too confusing). Most of our walk is by faith, but God is willing to give us signs along the way to let us know we are on the right road. I have always known I was called to the ministry of helps and would work with my hands, but I never thought my hand would be used in writing a book. The Lord has hidden talents in each of us waiting to be developed as we walk in obedience to His voice. Like the parable of the talents; if you don’t use it, you lose it. I’m reminded of a verse in 1Corinthians, chapter1:27; But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong.

         Total commitment is a life long process. It makes me think of a joke a visiting minister shared. There was a chicken and a pig that decided they wanted a breakfast of ham and eggs. The chicken said I’ll supply the eggs if you’ll supply the bacon. The pig answered, that’s alright for you to do, but for me it’s total commitment. Only by the grace of God can we come to a place of total commitment.

         I see my sisters-in-the-Lord as precious gifts directly from the hand of God. We’ve shared our joys and hurts. My pastor and brothers-in-the-Lord have blessed me with teaching and fellowship. The Lord has sent so many beautiful people into my life that have made an impact on me. He is continuing to do it through the Christian 12 Step co-dependent group that He recently led me into. It made me even more aware of the inner healings that the Lord has brought about in my life.

         Very recently, I was able to mourn over the death and loss of my father, whom I hadn’t seen since 1959. My son John and I had tried to find him for several years to no avail. He was already dead for two years when we were finally notified of his death. I’ve come to the place that I can see that my father, as well as my mother, always loved and cherished me and my brothers with unconditional love as we were growing up, so like our Heavenly Father. But, unlike Him, they didn’t have the character, power and authority to move that love into everyday practical life. Without God we just can’t do it right.

         Meanwhile the Lord had been moving and multiplying my natural blessings as well as the spiritual ones. Artie and I are now the proud and (sometimes humbled) grandparents of fourteen grandchildren. In time it will be seventeen grandchildren and a great granddaughter.

         John, our first son, and his wife Janet have four children; Christina (Chrissy), born 4/19/75; Sean, born 2/8/78; James (Jimmy); born 6/27/79; and Erica, born 6/10/81.

         Theresa, our first daughter, and her husband, Robert, have three children; Robert (Bobby), born 3/1/83; Roseanne, born 9/4/84; and AnnMarie, born 9/22/86.

         Patricia, our second daughter, and her husband, Fred, have two children; Dawn, born 9/5/80; and Ryan, born 3/19/82.

         Michael, our second son, and his wife, Mary, have two children; Leeann, born 1/17/85, and Michael, born 7/25/86.

         Kevin, our third son, and his wife, Christine, have three children. Mikey is Christine’s son and he was born on 11/30/ 87. Emily Rose was born 1/ 24/95. Eric Christian was born 12/9/97.

         Keith, our youngest son, and his wife, Susan, have three children; Jennifer, born 2/2/86; Karissa, born 9/19/87; and Jason, born 2/11/92.  

         They are a joy to us and I’m watching and waiting to see God move in their lives. My husband and children have flooded my life with cherished moments and memories, some via their touching letters, notes, poems and cards, which I jealously guard as priceless jewels. What they have given to me far exceeds anything I’ve given to them. I am truly blessed. Not only am I blessed, but my grandchildren are blessed to have such loving and caring parents to watch over them. Their successes and achievements through hard work are many and wonderful, but I’m most proud of just who they are by the grace of God.

         Throughout the years, I watched the Lord meet the needs of family, friends and people in our community through prayer. Yet, the Lord’s word to me is “You haven’t seen anything yet”. In 1Corinthians, chapter 2 verse 9, it is written; Eye has not seen, nor ear heard; neither has it entered into the heart of man, the things which God has prepared for them that love Him.” And I do love Him!!! To God be the glory. He has done great things for me.

         He will do the same for you if you will but ask and then receive from Him with an open and obedient attitude. May the Lord touch each of you who reads this for salvation, deliverance and every spiritual gift that He has waiting in store just for you because He loves you. In the precious Name of Jesus, I ask this, Amen!!!

         P.S. This story is to be continued by the Creator of us all who loves each of us with a love that won’t ever let go. Take responsibility for your life by placing it in His hands and He’ll prove it to you. Invite Him to move in your life. Please!!! 

RESPONSIBILITY IS OUR RESPONSE TO GOD’S ABILITY

Epilogue To God On The Move In My Life

         Since the writing of this book my brother, Frank, died at the age of 60 on March 25^th in 1998. My sister-in-law, Kathleen, was killed in an automobile accident on November 11^th at the age of 68 in 1999 and our first great grand-daughter, Tiana Destiny, was born June 8^th 2002.

         True to the word of the Lord, I have been writing booklets about the revelations the Lord has been giving me. I’m associated with this ministry that has a worldwide outreach via our web site.

         There is no doubt in my mind that God is continually moving in my life and He is faithful in fulfilling His every word that He has spoken to me as He continues to move ever onward in my life.

         I’ve had people tell me that it’s so wonderful that “I know” God. That’s equivalent to saying an ant knows all about people and how they think and feel and conduct themselves simply because it knows that “people” exist. It’s true that God has and is revealing Himself to me through several experiences and revelations that He is giving me. That means He is in the “process” of conforming me to His image in multiple ways. In order for us to truly identify with God, we need the mind of Christ developed in us. That’s why Jesus the Christ came into the world. He came to show us how to overcome the carnal mind that all humans are born with in this fallen condition of ours.

          We had the potential or incomplete mind of God in seed form in the original spiritual creation, but that was before we fell down into this physical creation that was never intended by God. The serpent is responsible for this kingdom of chaos. That’s why Jesus said, my kingdom is not of this world and why He came to redeem us back to Himself. Christ Jesus is the mediator between God and man. He came to take us back up “in our minds” so that we can just begin to communicate with God. Only an iota of His Presence can touch us simply because we couldn’t handle or understand anything more. He desires to make Himself known to us. He loves us and has a magnificent plan for His creation that will come to pass. Out God is in total control of His ultimate plan.

         Our carnal minds are incapable of believing and receiving from God and are actually programmed to resist anything from the Spirit of God. Romans 8:7-8 says the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. So then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. It will take all eternity to “know” God once we are reconnected or restored to Him in the fullness of time as part of the new creation man that has Jesus as the Head and we as His body. Revelation 12:5 speaks of this man child and is the true meaning of the so called “rapture."