You Can Trust God - Joyce Meyer Daily Devotional (October-01-2022)

1 comment

• Comment Link Saturday, 01 October 2022 07:36 posted by Kathleen Mendetta

  Thank you for your sermon today on Trusting God. I really get a lot out of your words, Gods words. You have a way of bringing it home for me and relating the Bible to everyday life. I was also abused as a child and learned to forgive my father and cared for him as long as I could toward the end of his life. He also had an unfortunate upbringing with many challenges himself so it just carried over. And I still at times has a struggle with forgiving my mother who is still here and involved in my life. She was too afraid to leave her marriage with 3 young children and no good job or education. She went to college got a degree and became a nurse stayed in that marriage until we were all grown. Which is kind of ironic since then we were all out of the abuse. She spent much of my young life depressed as I remember because my father was chronically unfaithful. But I think what hurt the most is that when I finally told my mother what my father was doing and how it made me feel, she confronted him and well what do you think he did. He said I was making it up, I was lying. And basically that was it. At some point in time later expecting that my mother would say, your father and I are getting a divorce and I will be sure to protect you he won't touch you again, she just said "It wasn't true". By this time the abuse had stopped but i was always fearful it could happen again at any moment. I thought God had answered my prayers but come to find out many many years later (like when I was 30) he had stopped abusing me because my younger sister had come of age. So knowing that I could not be trusted to keep his secrets he would move on to her. At the time I was around 11 and that made her 5 or 6 so I think that is about the age it started with me. I was a child and never thought about the fact that, that could have even been a possibility all I knew was Halleluiah he is leaving me alone. That is heartbreaking to me even today. But I cant believe that it never occurred to my mother that this could be the case. Later she told me she took him at his word. When years earlier he said it wasn't true she dismissed it from her mind. It was not until I was about 30 years old that I called my parents home and my father answered I asked for my mother and he said she was not at home. He was watching my 5 year old niece who my brother left in the care of my parents for a couple of hours. My brother nor his wife of course had never heard of the past accusations. I was livid that my mother would leave the home and knowing leave her granddaughter in the hands of a possible child abuser. I just feel that even if someone had said to me this person abused me as a child and the person said no I didn't there would still be a little something in my mind that would not allow me to leave a child, any child in the possession of that person. I got in my car and went to my parents home and picked up my niece. I called my mother and said you need to make absolutely sure that you never ever do that again. Why would you leave her there with him? You need to tell Billy why he cannot leave her there. She said absolutely not, if you have something to tell YOU need to tell him. Your father said that was not true so why would I after all these years not trust him. That hurt but she was right I had to share the past with my now adult brother. I had no idea how he was going to take it but I knew the only way I could possibly protect my niece was to have the talk with my brother because obviously my mother was going to be of no help. My brother although devastated by the news believed me and all is well there. My mother again confronted my father about my past accusations and this time he admitted what he had done to some extent at least. They separated within a year or two and divorced. Something I had long awaited as a child. But looking back I do believe that divorcing in the 70's would have probably had a detrimental effect on our lives as well. God has a reason and a plan and as you say we just need to trust in him. I now feel ready to do that more then ever. I made it this far so I do believe he will see me through and I pray for his guidance always. Thank you Joyce