I was raised in the Christian faith, but I never had a personal faith in Christ or fully grasped what His death or resurrection meant for me until adulthood.
I believed in God as a child, but by the age of nineteen, I was headed down a dark path, pursuing every possible practice of the occult. I delved into the practice of palm reading, card reading, astrology, and dabbled in witchcraft. As a result of my involvement with the occult, I was oppressed by spirits and had suffered with nightmares. I had no clue in how to free myself but little did I know that the Holy Spirit was pursuing me.
My spiritual turning point came through a book that was shared with me, which led to an encounter with the Holy Spirit one day. I describe it in detail through a few meditations in this book. I discovered the life changing power of God’s love, grace and mercy, which made me want to run out the door and tell everyone that Jesus died for our sins!
We are all witnesses of God’s grace in our own unique way. Every believer will touch someone else’s life, using the gifts and talents God gave them.
My inspiration to write began the year after the most difficult of losses, when my late husband, Stephen, was diagnosed with ALS
(Lou Gehrig’s disease).
He suffered a very rapid progression of the disease and it was 8 months from his diagnosis to his death in 2019.
As his primary caregiver, it was difficult to process all that happened in that one year period, when the following year was complicated by the Covid pandemic. In looking back, I refer to that year as my wilderness, because I felt spiritually depleted, and somewhat disconnected from God, friends and family. Being newly widowed, with family living out of state, and furloughed from my job, I decided to invest more time in reading scripture.
It was during this time that I began to discover treasures that were hidden in my wilderness. As I prayed and read scripture each day, I wrote my thoughts in a journal and developed a deeper intimacy with Jesus, as well as a new passion for writing.
Whether it’s through a book that was shared with me, or writing a book of my own, I have found that the grace of God can take one tiny seed of faith, put into action, and grow it into a huge fruitful tree.
I pray God’s blessing on every reader’s spiritual journey in this 50 day devotional.