Sarah's Revolution

“I will never say why me? Cause in my mind the answer is... Why not you?” Sarah explained her story to me with the strength of a woman who didn’t have a care in the world.  Her strength didn’t come from a place lacking suffering.  Far from it.  She experienced more pain than a lot of us will ever know, but Sarah knows the suffering wasn’t what made her weak or strong.  It is her heart that gives her strength, not the circumstances of life.  She has a hope in an eternal God who promised His son would reconcile us to Him and that our hearts were far more valuable to him than the temporary suffering of this world.

“Would I trade my heart for the joys of this world? Sarah continued, Never.”

“You talk about your heart being what gives you strength, I started. How?”

Sarah and I were sitting in an office inside her office building where she worked.  It was after hours and she was boss so we had all the time we needed.  Her absolute best feature was her deeply dark hazelnut colored eyes.  You could see experience and sincerity in them as soon as she looked your way.  You could tell she was not someone to be reckoned with.  Other than her deeply dark eyes she was fair complected with lots of freckles and red or blonde hair.  I couldn’t tell in the lighting.  She looked up at me, smiled, and said “Let’s start at the beginning, shall we?”

“I was a third child abandoned by my remarried mother to a set of grandparents without any explanation at the age of seven,” Sarah jumped right in.

“Okay, wow!” I responded. “You could almost stop there.”  I knew the pain of abandonment.  But this was her story, not mine.

“At 16 my grandfather was dying, and I was asked to make the decision on whether or not to continue his life support,” she said her voice starting to get softer.  This was painful for her. “I had to pay all the bills, stay on honor roll, and I was all alone when he died. I was told by my family from another state to not cry and just move on.”

“Go on.”

“Well, I wanted to die. Why am I still here God? I would pray every night.”

“So, did things get better when you were out on your own?” I asked, hoping to get out of the awkward sadness in the room. It only got worse.

“I got married to a man I loved very much and we had a child. Life was wonderful, until I got pregnant again.”

“Oh no, I can’t even imagine the loss of a child,” I presumptuously added to her story.

“Well, yes I had miscarried before my first child was born, but no that’s not what I was going to say,” she responded graciously. “I told my husband, and he was pissed.  I don’t mean stressed financially kind of angry.  I mean like the I’m leaving you if you don’t abort this baby kind of angry.”

“What’d you do?”

Sarah began to sob. “I labored alone.”

I reached out my hand to hers and consoled her as best I could.  I was out of my grid.

“Two years later, I begged him to go to counseling with me and he wouldn’t go.  He told me what I saw is what I got and that he wasn’t going to change.”

“Wow,” I was stunned.

“That’s not the end, Sarah said.  He actually hired a hitman a few months later to kill me.  The FBI got involved and everything.”

“This is crazy!” I said

“My story gets crazier, and I experience the loss of a brother, and another husband. But let’s not leave our concentration there, because after all, that’s not the real story. During all this I believe God reached out to me, comforted me and grew me for the sake of His love being revealed.”

“Wait, you mean to tell me God wanted you to suffer?” I retorted.

“No, I mean to say that in order for his love to be truly revealed he allows us to freely choose and that comes at great risk to us humans, because not all choose to give their hearts to him. Honestly, I have no clue how my heart could ever recover without his love.”

“So, you have a recovered heart and that’s what makes you strong?” I thought I was beginning to understand.

“More than recovered, I have a heart that has experienced revolution. The eyes of my heart see in a way they never were able to before.  I have hope, not the weak kind of keeping my fingers crossed kind, but the strong faith filled kind that says I know my God will come through.” Sarah began to look excited.

Sarah continued, “He knew on the cross as He suffered, that I would suffer and that made the cost to him invaluable.  He knew that I would receive a changed heart, and that if I could do that after all I suffered, then why not anyone else, why not you?”