Chapter 3
Learning To Trust God
2014 - 2017
One Thing After Another
These were some of the hardest years of my life.
During this same season, I also experienced a fall at a gym after stepping out of the shower. I landed hard on my left side, and afterward I began noticing trembling and weakness in my legs. I didn't know then how significant that fall would become later in my story.
Within two years, both of my fur babies passed away under tragic circumstances. Then, in 2016, my NeNaw passed away. She was another deeply personal loss during an already difficult season of my life.
My car was severely damaged by baseball-sized hail.
Only three months later, it was totaled when someone turned left in front of me.
I was blessed to have a Suburban, but two years later, I was involved in another accident when someone sped through a light. A family member then gave me an older car, but within a few months its transmission went out. Thankfully, I was able to trade that car in exchange for repairs on the Suburban.
During these years, I also went through five surgeries. Through each one, Father God provided paid time away from work and insurance that covered the majority of the medical expenses.
Losing My Career
Two weeks later, I lost the career job that I loved.
The financial situation quickly became even more difficult. I couldn't find another job that paid within $4 an hour of what I had been earning.
Then, because of circumstances that did not work in my favor, I was unable to refinance the house into my name. I had no choice but to put it up for sale.
During those years, I kept saying that I would trust God, even when I couldn’t see how everything was going to work out. Trust didn’t come easily for me, but God was patiently teaching me that He was someone I could depend on.
Looking back, I can see His provision woven throughout those difficult years. He didn’t prevent every hardship, but He never left me to face one alone. Again and again, when I couldn’t see a way forward, He made one.
I thought I was simply trying to survive one difficult circumstance after another. What I didn’t realize was that God was teaching me something I would need for the life He was preparing me to live:
to trust Him.
“Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”
— Proverbs 3:5–6 (KJV)
2014–2017
This was the season of my life when I truly learned to trust in the Lord. Throughout those years, I kept telling Him—and reminding myself—that I would trust Him. And I did.
It wasn’t easy. Trust did not come naturally to me. Life had taught me to guard my trust carefully, so learning to place my complete trust in God was something new for me.
Reflection
A Marriage Ending
At the same time, I was going through a divorce that ultimately took four years to complete. My husband had moved out two years into that process, leaving me responsible for all of the household bills while I was also dealing with harassment from his girlfriend.
Yet even through that, God continued providing the financial means for me to pay my bills.
About two years into the divorce, I was driving home from work one night when I heard the Lord speak to my spirit:
“I will never leave you.”
Hearing God clearly was something I struggled with, but that night, I knew it was Him. I began to cry—hard. In a season when so much around me seemed uncertain, those few words meant more to me than I could possibly explain.
I may not have known what was still ahead of me, but that night, God gave me something I desperately needed to know: I was not alone.
“…for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.”
— Hebrews 13:5 (KJV)
About six to eight weeks before my court date, my attorney passed away. He had been the only attorney in his firm, so suddenly I was without legal representation with my court date quickly approaching. His secretary helped find another attorney who was willing to take over my case, and just two weeks before court, God provided this new attorney without any additional cost to me.
The county had recently gotten a new divorce judge. During court, the judge made a snide comment about how I was getting everything in the divorce, even though my husband had failed to appear.
I may have received everything by default, but I was also left with the financial responsibility that came with it. My deceased attorney had believed I would need financial assistance and had planned to seek alimony because my husband had been the primary breadwinner during our marriage. Despite that, I was denied alimony.
I was now left trying to carry everything financially on a barely above-average salary.
CHAPTER
Learning to Trust
Through all of it, I was trying desperately to remain strong by leaning on God and trusting that He would see me through the mess.
It seemed as though every time I recovered from one thing, something else happened.
But through every loss, every financial difficulty, every surgery, every accident, and every uncertainty, God continued to provide what I needed.
One day, I told a coworker that I didn't know how to hear God. More than anything, I wanted His direction and wanted to truly recognize His voice.
God knew the desire of my heart.
And soon afterward, He gave me that desire.
