 |
 |
 |
| ROBIN'S STORY |
 |
 |
|
 |
 |
| As I look back on my life, I realize that I have had good parents. They took me to church every Sunday; my father was a deacon in the church. Even with that, there was something missing in my life.At the early age of seventeen, I got married. By eighteen, I had my first child, a son; I also had legal guardianship of my thirteen year old brother-in-law. Here I was at eighteen, raising 2 children. The next two years were hard on me for my husband(at that time) was in and out of prison. I had my second child, a daughter, when I was around twenty-one years old. Ours was not a marriage made in heaven; I basically raised my children on my own.It came to a point when I could not handle my brother-in-law anymore, and he went back to his family. My marriage broke up when my daughter was a year old. Due to my ex-husband and his family having so many problems with the law, I became very strict and hard on my children, mainly on my son. I was determined that he would not turn out to be like his father or his father’s family. Through all of this, I developed a bad temper. I would get very upset if things were not done the way I wanted them to be.I would remember my grandmother telling me that if I would just go to church and trust God, He would make everything all right.Years went by, and when my daughter was three years old, I met the man to whom I am married now. The first two years of our marriage were not easy. He had three children from his first marriage, and I had two children from my first marriage. We started to go to church every Sunday, but every Sunday was the same; we were always arguing and fighting. We felt like we were just using God, and we hated that. We felt there had to be more than this. Even though we loved each other, we didn’t know how much more pressure we could take. Our marriage was suffering; all our dreams were being destroyed. Then one Sunday, we broke into little groups at church and a question came up that we could not answer. "What is the Holy Ghost?" I had no idea and neither did my husband. We went to the pastor of that church and he tried to explain it to us. When we left, we were even more confused. We had never heard anything preached about the Holy Ghost. Two years after we got married, we had a child of our own, who was born with some health problems. For months we struggled on our own. Then one day, my husband came home from work all excited. There was a man at his work that had started talking to him about the Lord. (The exciting thing about this was that the man had never done this kind of work before, and here he was working next to my husband!) Everyday my husband would come home from work and tell me what his co-worker had said. The end of August 1984, we went to our first service at his co-worker’s church, Bethel Apostolic. Finally, we felt something stir in both of us! In just a couple of weeks we both got baptized in Jesus’ name and a week later we both received the Holy Ghost, What a change!!!! We both were smokers; my husband smoked three packs a day. That night after we received the Holy Ghost, we had no more desire for cigarettes. We were free. Our marriage was healed; a little later, our child was healed. We were on our way. There were no more voids in my life. I turned my life over completely to the Lord; He helped me with my temper. I am not the same person I was eighteen years ago. My oldest child is living for the Lord. When he was sixteen years old, the Lord called him to preach. He and his wife have started a church in Kentucky. They have a little boy named Ethan who was born with a lot of serious health problems, but to God, problems are nothing. He is our Healer, our Comforter, our Peacemaker; He is everything. Even though we go through problems from time to time, I am so blessed to know Jesus. I have learned to put all my trust in Him. My daughter is married and has a little girl and a little boy. My youngest son, who was so sickly when he was born, has grown up to be a nice young man. He has learned to trust in the Lord, also.Everything I have, God has given to me; without Him, I am nothing. He has blessed me and my family over and over again. I am so glad that the Lord put someone at my husband’s job to witness to him. My only regret is that I wish I would have found the truth much sooner. I will never forget what the Lord has done for me. Thank you, Jesus for loving me and helping me. Thank you for molding and shaping me into what I should be. |
 |