Stories from the Field: The last chapter????

Stories from the Field by Gretchen Smith

The Last Chapter????

I had been serving as an independent bi-vocational missionary for about 12 years when my dad got diagnosed with cancer and died six months later but more about that later.

As a woman and an INTJ Mastermind with excellent skills in strategic development but limited formal education formal mission opportunities were not really available to me, not to mention I was Southern Baptist so they just sort of looked at my like I had two heads. No one really knew what to do with me but God did. By the time my dad died at the age of 56 I had served in Africa, The Middle East, Haiti, St. Croix, Florida and Kentucky and every project was successful except one...finding me a husband to serve alongside me. I just could not seem to meet him so in 2004 I returned from overseas with two purposes. Firstly, I wanted to find a new sending church as the one that originally sent me split and provided 0 support so I was literally starving, and I wanted to find a Godly man to marry. I returned to USA to Florida and was just getting on my feet when 4 hurricanes hit leaving me homeless and I could not afford to rent any of the places that were livable. There was only one opportunity open to me...an artist relocation program in Kentucky so I packed up my tiny Honda Civic and went to Kentucky sight unseen to start a new life in the midst of a drug infested community of condemned buildings...sure God I will go...whatever.

Kentucky was far more foreign to me than any foreign mission field despite the fact that I had spent summer there with my grandmother on the other side of the state. I found a nice little up and coming evangelical church and thought it might work. There was a nice man I met but we were taking it slow. Another girl and I met him at the same time and he ended up with her so that did not work out but I stayed focused on my goals of which finding a new sending church was a priority and this church was delighted with me...that is until I tried to actually step into my rightful role as leader. Wow did I run smack dab into the middle of a good ol boys club the likes of which I had never seen anywhere in the world.

I was not to be deterred though because by now I was a few years in and I had a timeline and a goal and I do not fail to achieve my goals. I was left out of meetings, my monies from grants that I wrote for specific purposes were used for things that were not approved and I had no access to the money that had been given based on my credibility and soon it was clear the once lovely church was moving in a very wrong direction. I could see it plain as day and sat the pastor down and warned him to change course. He of course was not about to listen to a woman that he apparently saw as something like a secretary. LOL. I am a Deborah. I do strategy for 10,000 men...I just could not find my Barak and no sir I am not your secretary.

Anyway I was muddling along ignoring the nonsense and doing my thing and watching God do his when my dad started reporting he was not feeling well. I knew it was cancer long before he did. I made a strategic plan for his treatment that had the best potential outcome but other family members interfered and influenced him and he made a different choice. 6 months later he died. In the middle of that the church I had now invested 5 years merged with another church and forgot about me despite the fact that I sent weekly updates to the prayer team. The week after I returned from the funeral I walked into the new facility because they had merged with some church that had a bigger facility and were sharing the building or something and I sat down in a pew barely able to hold it together and the head of the prayer team who was also the associate pastor walked up to me and noticed I was sad and slapped me on the back and said SMILE....IT'S A GREAT DAY IN THE LORD. Now I had emailed this man weekly for 6 months with prayer updates about my dad including his death so there is no way he did not know what was going on since he was head of the prayer ministry. I stood up, walked out and never went back and not one person ever called me to even check on me.

Lost and confused and hurting I stumbled around a bit for many months. Due to financial strain and competition that swooped in while I was travelling to care for my father I lost my business and eventually I lost my house. There was no husband in site and very little support other than two nice couples who stepped up and encouraged me and provided a little financial assistance for a bit and a pastor from another denomination who started grief counseling with me. I took a job as a caregiver...it was awful. I blessed them but received no blessing. My dad's death was way too much for me but no one seemed to understand or care at all about my pain other than just this one pastor I barely knew and a few faithful friends. Frankly I did not have nearly enough support at all and I did not get through. I had an all out emotional meltdown and crisis due to lack of support. I reached out and reached out and no one responded. Phone calls and emails were ignored, appointments and lunches were missed with lots of excuses but the truth was people did not want to face my pain. I had a lot of pain. I had lost my dad, my church, my job and my home. It was all a bit much.

The pastor that was counseling me was watching me deteriorate rapidly and no amount of encouragement would help. Nothing stopped the tears and no one wanted to deal with my hurt or anger and professional counselling was quickly proving useless. Most people simply did not care much but every once in awhile someone would throw me a crumb of support which was actually worse. It was sort of like having diarrhea exploding all over you but no running water or washcloth and people were standing their with a lock on the water tap refusing to take it off and screaming at you that you are filthy and disgusting and to clean yourself up but not giving you a washcloth or access to the water or soap (sorry gross but that is the best analogy I can come up with).

The pastor was wise enough to know if I stayed amongst the people that were letting me down over and over again that I would not recover so he advised me to move and start over. I picked a sandy beach in a warm location and he helped me with the gas money and I drove my 30 year old truck ALONE with everything I owned 3000 miles away and started over because I needed warm weather and the beach. I still needed a husband but that seemed like an impossibility since I could not find a Godly man AT ALL...I simply did not meet any despite going on an average of 2-3 dates a week for years.

Anyway fast forward to Mexico in 2012-2016. I adapted quickly and spent nine months resting and recovering and was just getting on my feet and just having a nice time when a man was shot in front of me and died in my arms and I went to jail for it. I did not know the man and it turned out to be some hit that the police were in on and the whole thing was horrible. After day 4 in jail with no water, no food, no phone call, no charges, no nothing I started singing Jesus loves me at the top of my lungs off key. Eventually the police outside of my cell got tired of listening to me (4 hours later) and he simply opened the door to the cell and walked outside for a cigarette break. I ran out of that cell and home to find the police had tossed my house. I am not a girl that looks the other way when there is an injustice so I fought and the underworld in Mexico turned out to be really bad. God showed me everything plain as day and I fought for change and won some battles and lost some. Frankly Mexico was wonderful the first year and hell for 3 years due to watching children being trafficked by dirty police but that is a story for another day. After 4 years and a lot of PTSD from witnessing not one but two murders I needed to leave. The fireworks were setting me off and I suppose at some point the cartel would have figured out I was the one rescuing the children they had trafficked and killed me like they had killed so many others but I was not afraid of them...I just needed sleep.

I chose a new destination that would be quiet and calm..my favorite place. Belize. It was my very first trip overseas back in 1994 and I had always wanted to return so I did. I got a job and settled in and was working on getting back on track and still looking for that elusive husband. I fell in love and thought maybe it might lead to marriage. All looked pretty good until this year...this year I got cancer....a really bad and dangerous kind too and a few months into the relationship I had to tell him it was serious and it spread. He had already basically bailed anyway...and he is in ministry..sigh just another disobedient man to add to the list. I don't care about the cancer though. I care about one thing. After 16 years God still has not provided me with the husband and child that he promised me and now in a few weeks they are going to rip out my womb.

I have been faithful year after year after year and yet it seems despite all of the fasting and prayer and obedience and faith and service that I am still suffering the generational curses of my ancestors. They tell me that if I don't have the surgery it can spread really fast and kill me. I don't believe them. 50% of the diagnosis of this type of cancer are wrong. I believe they are wrong but the question is do I have enough faith to trust that God will step up when he has not stepped up in my life before. When I pray for me my prayers are ignored. When I pray for others God nearly always answers my prayers for them but not for me and I can't see the thread. They say you can look back on all the bad things that have happened to you and see why you went through them and that something good would come of them. Nothing good has ever come of the bad things that happened to me...just more hurt and more pain and more killing, stealing and destroying usually from within my own ranks.

I have been reflecting on the fact that when I pray for others God almost always answers but when I pray for me he does not. Perhaps because my prayers for myself are selfish like wanting my dad to live or not wanting to watch as children suffer sex trafficking or wanting a vehicle to help others or a home that is safe and near the water or a husband. Apparently the things I have asked for for me are of no concern to God. Apparently he does not care about me. That is the lie Satan tells me everyday.

As I face health, housing, job, and relationship issues once again I am always asking God what I need to change...what I need to do differently. You know what my answer is. Not one single thing. I have been faithful. I have stayed the course. All I have to do is stand my ground and when I have done all STAND. It is up to God to do the rest. Maybe this time he might actually answer my prayers. If not you can find me on a deserted island with ten lovers living on coconut and fish until I die cuz after 16 years of being single I have had enough.

Psalm 68:6 God sets the solitary in families

I suppose that verse is supposed to cheer me up but it does not. I have a lousy family...not one of them even wished me a Merry Christmas or even responded to my email when I told them I had cancer. All I have ever wanted was to be a helpmeet and mother and now they are going to rip out my womb. Satan can go back to hell where he belongs and stay there and God it is time for you to step up.