All About GOD - Growing Relationships with Jesus and Others

“I am Here.” Love, God.

What are you looking for?
Who are you looking for?
Or may I ask, what or who is looking for you?

Could it be that the answer to all of those questions is one and the same?
I’m wondering if you have answers yourself . . .
If not, what will it take for you to find the answers?
It seems that peace, purpose and meaning are sometimes hard won in our lives and arrived at in what is a rather circuitous route.

So moved by my friend Sandy’s life—her search for Something and Someone,
and His search for her . . .
her desire to know peace when life’s most intimate relationships had fallen woefully short, and how Sandy came to find it in the most unlikeliest manner, I asked if I should share her story. She readily agreed. Maybe you’ll find parts of yourself in her tragic journey.

Raised in Southern California, Sandy grew up in a strict Catholic school environment that taught her about God; yet because her childhood was fraught with heartache and letdown caused by her parents, it was all so confusing. She did what she could to get out on her own as soon as she graduated high school, including going solo in her faith. No more church for her.

Entering into what turned out to be a rough marriage, young Sandy’s joy lay in her two fair-haired daughters, Tiffani and Robin. His absence and her discovery of a crazy long extramarital affair prompted her to divorce her husband. As a single mother in need of emotional healing, Sandy turned to New Age personal development and psychotherapy—kind of a natural thing to do, being that she was living in edgy Laguna Beach. Oh she still
→believed in God, but it was a belief not any kind of relationship.
Like so many others I have talked with over the years, she wanted nothing to do with ‘organized religion’ – too much hypocrisy, she said. Plus, she agonized about how a loving God could let her suffer the abuse of an atheistic, alcoholic father and then a sadly disappointing marriage?!

When oldest daughter Tiffani graduated from high school, she took off on a road trip with a guy she met at the beach – John. Early on, in his possessiveness of Tiffani, he separated her from family. At one point, as he moved her from state to state, Sandy did not know where her daughter was for seven years, but she knew John had begun terribly abusing Tiffani. Completely out of her control, all Sandy could do was pray for Tiffani, so she prayed more and more that God would save her daughter. Ironically, about the same time, Tiffani reported that she had chosen Jesus as her Savior, was meeting with other ladies and reading the Bible.

‘Then I got a phone call from Tiffani, saying that John was going to kill her,’ Sandy recounted. “There’s no way out, Mom,” she said. He knew how to kill and not get caught, had already killed a man in San Antonio. “Let me come and get you!” I pleaded with her, but she said, “No, Mom. If I leave him, he will kill you and Robin too.” ‘I told her I loved her, and just asked God to help her.’

‘Two weeks later, Robin called at 7 am one morning and told me John had killed her,’ while the couple was living in El Paso. Sandy flew to claim her body, but John blocked her access—including seeing Tiffani for the last time. After begging and even collapsing to the ground, he eventually gave Sandy access to the body, just after the autopsy. It was there—in that room, seeing her beautiful, tall slender daughter like she was—that Sandy screamed out to God. “GOD, if you are there, please help me! I can’t go on without you!” God might as well have said in an audible voice, “I Am Here.”

Strangely, the day I called Sandy to confirm some of these details would have been Tiffani’s 46th birthday. She was grieving mightily—however, she has God now, and knows he has her. Soon after Tiffani’s death, Sandy found a church where she felt the presence of God, she listened to Christian radio, and began reading the Bible. [It was then I met her, as she came to Women of Passion ~ about 12 years ago]

Without prompting, Sandy volunteered the Bible verses that have meant so much to her: Psalm 27.13 - I remain confident of this: I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.
Isaiah 55.9 – “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.
And then she shared another amazing verse: Isaiah 61.7 - Instead of your shame you will receive a double portion, and instead of disgrace, you will rejoice in your inheritance. And so you will inherit a double portion in your land, and everlasting joy will be yours.” A double portion she has received . . . daughter Robin had twin boys, absolutely identical – even though there is no family history of twins!

And joy? Yes, Sandy knows joy, to be sure. And though ‘Part of losing a child—no matter how they die—is blaming yourself, at least in part, now the guilt is gone.’

But do not miss it—Sandy found God because God was near when her heart was wrenched from her chest, and she turned to him. “God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our consciences, but shouts in our pains. It is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” Yes, Mr. Lewis, he sure does, and he says, “I Am Here.”

p.s. I offered to change the names to protect Sandy’s identity, but she said, ‘Oh no, please use our names. I think it would honor Tiffani.’

“I am Here.” Love, God.

What are you looking for?
Who are you looking for?
Or may I ask, what or w..

“I am Here.” Love, God.

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