As I meditated on God’s Word yesterday, He brought back to my mind His faithfulness, and showed me how His plans have come together for me. The Scripture I was meditating on is: “This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live and that you may love the Lord your God, listen to His voice, and hold fast to Him. For the Lord is your life” (Deut 30:19-20a) I’ve told you before that I was sexually molested at age 5 by an adult next-door neighbor. The same thing happened to two of my best friends on my street, one a year older, one a year younger. One of the girls told her parents about herself and about the other two of us.

In later years my Mom told me the following events; I don’t think I knew them at the time. The three sets of parents got together and met with our pastor, the chief of police and a doctor to determine their path forward. I can imagine the thoughts swirling around their heads when they learned that their precious little girls had been molested by an obvious serial pedophile, who lived between all of our houses and had two boys younger than us. I don’t know if it was at the same meeting, or if there was one that followed, but this pedophile and his wife were also in a meeting with all the parents, the pastor, police chief and doctor. What sticks out for me here is that although I am certain that our parents probably wanted to beat the hell out of this man, they chose to seek the Lord. “Seek the Lord while He may be found; call on Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake their ways and the unrighteous their thoughts. Let them turn to the Lord, and He will have mercy on them, and to our God, for He will freely pardon.” (Isaiah 55:6-7)

I believe all this happened in 1965/66. Ultimately, the man was sent to the psych hospital in Galveston, he and his wife sold their house and moved away with their two sons, and I don’t know what happened to any of them after they left. But what I do know is that our parents watched us closer, we were raised in the church, and seeking the Lord wasn’t a one-time thing with my parents. They were engaged in our youth group, and they made a difference not only in our lives, but in the lives of many. They knew that Jesus had overcome the world. “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33)

Over ten years later we were living in another house in the same town, and still attended the same church. A woman with 4 kids and her husband and their step-father lived in the same house in our old neighborhood where the pedophile lived. I don’t know the particulars, but I do know that at least one of the little girls was sexually molested by their step-father. My parents brought all those kids into our home while the woman was leaving her husband, and they lived with us for some time. I’m certain that brought up a lot of pain for my parents, but as they had been through the same thing, they knew how to help and on whom to depend. “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God.” (2 Cor. 1:3-4)

Yesterday I rejoiced that the Lord gave me to my parents, who knew to seek Him, and listened to Him on what steps to take, and they were faithful in taking those steps. And then I thanked Him for especially in this last year showing me that the shame I held onto, didn’t come from Him and how to let it go. The Lord is faithful. And I choose to love the Lord my God, obey Him and commit myself firmly to Him. And He will direct my steps with His loving eye on me, just as it has always been.