Real Treasure

Kat said, "How has love changed your life?"

I am The Treasure Box. Look inside and you will see many treasures. At first the box was filled with worldly treasure, costume jewelry that looked good and expensive; now it is not. It has been replaced with true Treasure.

I was born in Tampa, Florida and raised in Venezuela. My father was a Latino with earthly desires for gambling and women. My mother lived in a foreign country, holding a full time job while trying to raise five children on her own. Whenever they separated, we moved away, once to Spain for a year, and twice to Ohio.

When I was twelve, they divorced. I had always lacked self-esteem, but now I could not relate to people anymore, especially boys. I did not receive the emotional support that I needed from my parents. I felt like I was on my own, and a huge, craving hole in my heart begged to be filled.
I started to fill my treasure box with boys. I wanted to be loved, and I looked for it with members of the opposite sex. If a boy kissed me and touched me, then I felt accepted. And there was a chance that I was pretty, or he wouldn’t have been attracted to me.

I then filled the treasure box with drugs and alcohol. It felt so good to escape! And finally I had a crowd that accepted me. But, as time went on, I hated myself more and more.

At the age of 17, I accepted the Lord as my Savior but never went to church or read the Bible. Two years later I moved back to the states and continued my life of drugs, alcohol and sex, still searching for the one thing that would fill up that hole in my heart.

The inevitable happened. I got pregnant. I was going to get married but my boyfriend’s parents were against it so I did something that I will regret for the rest of my life. I had an abortion. Even writing about it today fills my heart with sadness. I had a child growing within me, and I got rid of this little human being because it was the easy way out. I did not take responsibility for my own actions.

I filled my treasure box with adultery, lying, cheating, stealing, and hate. I hated myself and the world. I fought everybody and lived a selfish life. I longed for purity, it was such a strong desire, but I couldn’t find it anywhere. Some missionaries got a hold of me and I joined a church that was steeped in works-related living. If I was good, I was rewarded. If I was bad, I was punished.
Now I had a treasure box full of religion that I lived for 20 years. But I was still empty.
I married an angry, controlling, broken man who abused me physically, emotionally and verbally, just as I did to him. We had three children. My self-hate continued to grow. I believed some of the things he said about me and started to feel like I was a horrible mother, wife and person. I just couldn’t get it right.

We divorced after 12 years and I rebounded into a marriage that was worse than the previous one. We had a daughter. After receiving within me the ugly words he said to me, I thought I was the scum of the earth and honestly believed that the world would be better off without me. I would write hate letters to myself and hurt myself for punishment. I wanted to die. I believed that my children didn’t deserve a mother like me.

After about two years, we divorced, and I jumped right into another marriage. This third husband was also very angry and controlling. We had a son.

I had become a full-blown co-dependent person. One who works for love. “If I do nice things for you and forsake my personality for you, you will love me”. It is a form of controlling other people’s behaviors. And I was very good at it, too!

I now had a treasure box full of children, ex-husbands, horrible behaviors and habits, and I still was not happy. What was missing?

In January of the year 2000, I found the answer. It was Jesus Christ. I received Him into my life again; this time I gave Him full control. I let Him be the Lord of my life. A difficult thing to do for someone as controlling as I was.

God and I emptied out the treasure box and filled it up with Real Treasure. He put in Love. His Love - a pure Love that is unconditional. A Love that said, “I love you even as the mess that you are. You are a treasure to Me and I delight in you.”

Zephaniah 3:17 (NIV) says,
“The LORD your God is with you,
He is mighty to save.
He will take great delight in you,
He will quiet you with his love,
He will rejoice over you with singing.”

I was not alone. I never had been alone. Even through my most horrible choices in life, He was right there with me, arms open wide and waiting for me to accept His Offer of Love. It took a long time to accept that Love. But I finally did.

Into my treasure box God, put Forgiveness for every wrong I had committed that hurt Him. EVERY sin!

Isaiah 43:25 (NIV) “I, even I, am He who blots out your transgressions, for my own sake, and remembers your sins no more.

He filled my treasure box with Acceptance. He accepted me as His very own. No matter what I looked like on the outside or even the inside, I was accepted by Him!

Romans 8:1-2 (NLT) 1 So now there is no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus. 2 And because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving Spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.

He then filled my treasure box with Healing. He worked hard with me to realize that I didn’t need drugs, alcohol or men to be fulfilled. He was sufficient for me. He was all I needed. He personally worked with me to slowly clean up the messes that I had created through my choices. I am still a work in progress, though. It’s not the end, but I have my Best Friend to lead me and guide me through this process.

One night, I imagined what I will do when I meet Him face to Face. I will get down and wash his feet with my tears and wipe them dry with my hair, my kisses never-ending on those scarred feet. Scarred for me. His hands would be next as I lovingly hold them and touch the imprints left by the nails. The nails He suffered for me. Then I will dance with Him, looking into His eyes and falling deeper and deeper into Him along with my love. Will He sing? I believe so, and I have a feeling that His voice would resonate in my soul, like a fine-tuned guitar string. Just the thought of being with Him leaves me in tears. He is the Love of my life; my Redeemer, my Savior, my Healer.

I have a treasure box on the corner of my desk. In it I have little cards that describe each and every Personal Touch He has given me over the years. I wish I could tell you in one writing all the Personal Miracles He has performed in my life. But it would take up a book!

And that is why I call myself the Treasure Box. I was empty and tried to fill that box with my choices, my treasures, what I thought was good for me. It wasn’t until He got a hold of me that it has slowly been filled with Real Treasure; His Personal Involvement in my life; His Personal Love and Redeeming Grace.

2 Corinthians 4:7 NLT, “We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.”

Today, along with my God, I walk with a husband who God chose for me, a wonderful Englishman with whom I share a business. My five beautiful children walk with the Lord, thanks to His guidance and because of His help. For the first time in my life, I love myself and know that God thinks I am beautiful. I am just the way He created me. I am accepted. He is my Source for everything, and I pray that He will become yours, too!

May the Lord bless you with the Spirit of Wisdom and Revelation that you, too, will get to know Him better!

Kat C - The Treasure Box

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God's Love Saves

Anonymous Said... "How has Love changed your life?"

I was just 3 years old when my adopted father took my 1/2 brother and I across the country and away from my mom. I was the only child from her first marriage. She ran away from my dad because he was physically abusing her. When they divorced, the court ordered him and his family to stay away from me until I was 18 years old.

When mom remarried, my “real” dad gave up all rights to me in order that my “new” step dad could adopt me. My younger brother was barely walking when my new father took us to Ohio and left us with his family while he went to Vietnam. I didn’t know why mom wasn’t with us. I missed her so much. My brother and I were the invisible kids in a house with 3 older kids, an Auntie Ann and an Uncle on a farm in Ohio.

I turned 4 in Ohio. I took care of my brother and tried to stay out of the way of the people whose house we lived in. At every turn I felt the inconvenience we were to them. I learned a secret game called humpa-humpa taught to me by "cousins" in the barn behind the pig pen. I learned that even though you were told that the peel was the best part of orange and that, yes, your brand new barbie's hair will grow back if you put her in the fridge over night, cousins don't know everything and years later I see that it was not just that they didn't know everything, but they were fine-tuned in how to be cruel.

I missed my mom so much. Even today that 3 year old girl is the epicenter of my emotions and every heartbreak in my life. Every hurtful action or careless word or misunderstanding takes my heart back to the pain of that little girl. And, I just want to run away to say "I don't care about anyone! No one cares about me! I will just disappear!"

I lived with Dad, his new wife and my little brother until I was 12 years old. At 12 I was suddenly old enough to decided who I wanted to live with. I chose Mom. Why would I stay with a family who didn't even want me (long story, for another post). The only person I was really related to in that house was my brother and that was only by half blood.

Mom was remarried and I had another little brother--five years younger than me. I thought that mom and I would be so close. I had a fine-tuned sense of justice and I soon determined that I was not there because mom loved and wanted me there. I was there to take care of my brother, to wash the dishes, to clean the house, to cook the meals, to wash and iron the clothes--to be the free slave-labor.

I was more alone and sadder even than when I lived with Dad. Happiness seemed like such an illusive thing--just around the corner and always out of reach. If only there were someone who really loved me, ME, for me. Was there anyone in the world who really loved me or wanted me?

The good thing about living with Mom was that once I had ALL my chores done I was pretty much left alone. We lived on a large ranch and I spent my free time journaling, hiding from my little brother in trees, on the roof of the barn, or in a haystack hidey hole. Or, I would hop on my bike and ride as far and fast as I could dreaming that there was someone who would miss me if I just disappeared or died.

When I was 14, my best friend from when I lived with Dad talked me into running away. She wanted to go to California to find her dad. We hitch-hiked to California (from Idaho). We never even looked for her dad. We slept on the streets, in homeless shelters, stranger's couches and stranger's beds. We traded sex for a place to crash, food, drugs or for just a person to pay attention to us and make us feel needed.

My friend was similar to me in that she came from a broken home and just needed to feel that someone loved and cared for her. The interesting thing about our relationship is that five years earlier she had led me to the Lord. She told me that I was a sinner and that Jesus died to save me from my sins and that if I asked Him, He would come into my heart and live there forever. I wanted that and I said the sinner's prayer with her.

That was it. I believed, but I didn't know anything about being a "Christian." As the months and years went by, I forgot about that prayer and I forgot about my Savior.

Eventually we were both arrested for shoplifting and were sent back home to our families. We were now street smart from our four months on the streets of San Jose. We knew how to panhandle, tell a convincing sob story, trade sex for just about anything, how to smoke pot, meth or anything else that was given to us; we were expert delinquents; doing whatever our hearts desired.

Going home was difficult. I no longer fit in at home, at school or with any of my former friends. Within three months I ran away again--this time by myself. I spent three months on the streets. I could write volumes from these "street" days. I have many stories of God's protection and grace. Even though I wasn't following Him--didn't even know what that meant--He was taking care of and protecting me.

I eventually returned home to find that Mom was going through her third divorce. We moved to Portland Oregon for a job she got there. I decided to join Job Corp rather than get a job or try to go back to school. Mom and I fought a lot so I moved into the dorms. I lied constantly, stole anything that wasn’t tied down, basically did whatever I wanted and was always in trouble. I was arrested for using someone else’s credit card and I spent a week in juvenile hall awaiting a court date and sentencing.

This juvenile hall was a plush mansion compared to where I had stayed in California or even the girl’s dorm at Job Corp. There were only about 6 other girls in there with me. I didn’t really spend anytime socializing. I was downcast and knew that I was in serious trouble this time. Mom had told me that she gave up on me and she didn’t come to see me in jail. I knew that I was looking at being locked up at the very least until my eighteenth birthday--two and a half years.

There was a bookcase there and I spent that week in my own cell/room reading. The books were bible stories written in modern english with pictures. I read that whole week. I knew that God was impressing on me that I needed to follow Him, to do right and not wrong. I prayed that He would forgive me and I vowed to live my life right.

Surprising to me and especially to my Mom, the judge let me off the hook with time served and unsupervised probation. Wow! I knew that God had saved me. I couldn’t go back to Job Corp. I’d been in too much trouble and they finally kicked me out. Mom and I fought all the time. She was in a sad place in her life and she blamed me for a lot of her problems. She was probably right--it’s tuff to hold your life and your sanity together when you have such a willful and rebellious child.

She was dating a guy from Missouri and she moved us out there for a new start. I went back to regular school and did fairly well for a while. No one knew me and I enjoyed playing the part of an innocent 16 year old. I even went to church and got baptized.

School was too boring so I dropped out and got my GED. I dated a cowboy and we moved in together and were married about a year later. We moved around a lot between Missouri and Iowa because he changed jobs a lot. I didn’t go to church any more. I worked at a bar as a cocktail waitress and would often go to after hours parties with the customers.

I was 20 years old when I was expecting my first child. Mom was going through her fourth divorce and was planning to move back to Idaho. She talked me and my husband into moving there too. Before my son was even a year old, I started hooking up with old friends, and boyfriends, getting high and cheating on my husband. Our marriage eventually broke up and I spent the next 5 years partying and working. My son was hardly ever with me. He was with his grandma or a babysitter or with his dad who had moved back to Missouri.

I fell in love with a heroine addict and I became addicted to cocaine. I thought I was having the time of my life. I couldn’t see that I was very close to hitting the bottom of the barrel. One night I almost overdosed. My heart was racing so fast and I felt like my spirit was leaving my body. I went outside to try to breath and I remember holding onto a car and trying to catch my breath. I prayed for God to please help me. I couldn’t die from an overdose and leave my son this way. An angel came up behind me and put his hand on my back. I immediately felt calmer and my heart slowed down. He told me that I would be okay, that I would live.

That was the last time I shot up. But my troubles were not over yet. My boyfriend broke up with me, my room mate moved out on me and I felt hopeless. My life was really falling apart. I didn’t want to move in with my mom, but I only had two weeks before the rent was due. I got down on my knees and prayed that God would show me what to do. I had a best friend who lived in Portland and I had another best friend in Albuquerque. The next morning I knew that I was moving to Albuquerque. Within the week, I sold everything that wouldn’t fit in my car and moved me and my son to Albuquerque.

Miraculously I got a job the first week as an administrative assistant at a large corporation. I was able to get a small apartment and my son and I had so much fun together learning a new city; making new friends. My best friend told me about this church near my place and that I should check it out. I did and I loved it. The pastor taught the Bible and applied it to real life situations. The music was like nothing I had ever heard in a church before--it was modern and meaningful! We began attending all the time--anytime there was a service, we were there. I learned what it meant to be a “Christian” for the first time in my life.

God has done so many miracles in my life, He has changed me into a person that the people from my past don’t even recognize. It’s now almost 20 years later and I’ve gone through many ups and downs in life. The Lord gives and the Lord takes away. But I can truly say “Blessed be the name of the Lord!” I know that He can never be taken away. If all else is stripped from me, I still have Him.