God Didn't Forget About Me

   These past twenty months have been so hard for me. Exactly twenty months and one week ago, my youngest daughter's dad served me with custody suit papers. Like any normal person, I think I am the last person worthy of such a suit but nevertheless, we have been in and out of court since then and have yet to come to a final ruling. However, the judge granted him as the domiciliant parent, which really broke my heart and my spirit. Since then, I have felt so lost.
   I began working in Louisiana after graduating from a community college in my home town. I thought I was moving to better myself, but I have had problem after problem since I have been here. The custody suit was more like the straw that broke the camel's back. The irony of it all was, I had gotten saved the spring before the move then I moved, and was right back in the way of the world, and after the suit began I began to question my faith.
   In the course of the twenty months, I have lost so much. My good image, my sense of home, my actual apartment, friends, and most importantly my faith. I had began to question if God existed at all.
    No, I did not move to Louisiana to become a stripper, yet it is what I found myself doing to make a living. Yet, that lifestyle and trying to be a Christian has never mixed, so I was already in a battle before the custody issue.  However, with all the turn of events in my life, I began to feel myself gravitate more toward actually BEING a stripper which is the total opposite of what I wanted. I felt that God obviously did not care about me if he would allow my daughter to be taken from me. For that reason, I did not see a reason to continue to try to be a Christian, but from time to time I tried.
   This has been one of the hardest battles I have fought. I wanted to just completely let go and say, " God does not care about me. Why should I continue to praise him and pray to him?" I tried talking with some of my friends as well as some the women I saw as mentors, and they could not help me. Some talked to me about faith, which was something totally foreign to me. No one had ever talked to me about faith growing up.  I tried talking to my pastor, but how can you tell your pastor, you have began to question God. I tried visiting other churches and thought I had stumbled upon something when I found a church with a prophetess, but no one could tell me anything. Sometimes I wondered if I was asking the right questions, but now thinking back on it, I am sure I was not. I remember getting upset because I could not catch the Holy Ghost. I needed to feel something to know that He really existed.
   The answer did not come fast enough, and I just wondered away. I stopped questioning and decided God had forgot about me. My family was telling me to pray, and sometimes to keep them happy I would say I was, but that had long ago stopped.  I just felt like God could not care because I was going through something in  every aspect of my life. The business partnership I had invested so much time into had collapsed. Dancing was not really paying the way it used to. My other kids were unhappy about the move. It seemed like every plan I came up with, failed. Even now, I say I am on Plan M. I have not attended church in months.
   However I did decide to start my magazine, and though it is still moving slow, so slow that I still have to dance, I realize I have found something that I love, something that I am passionate about. That gave me some peace, but of course I was still worrying.
   A couple of months ago, I met Lorna Lewis, author of The Gift of an Abundant Life . I liked her positive way of thinking and wanted her to speak at a session I was trying to put together. Therefore, I decided to read her book. To be honest, I have yet to finish reading the book, because of my schedule, but I love it. I was so amazed at Lorna's faith and she spoke in way anyone could relate to, but at the same time, I still felt nothing. Whenever I looked around me, things were only getting worse.
   In the beginning, I was questioning God, but by this time, I wondered if He even existed. Last week my car broke down like it does every semester, and I have been trapped in the house. I was so upset. I actually came out and begin to tell people what I had began to think, my thoughts and opinions about God. Over the weekend, I read more of The Gift of An Abundant Life .I decided to just give faith another try like 'O well, what do I have to lose when I have already lost everything as it is?'
  Now I am not trying to act like my life has changed so dramatically or that I have changed so dramatically, but today I witnessed two events that have made me believe. I have been trying with all my might to get my magazine off the ground. This morning, I got an invite to be a guest on a radio show. I accepted the invitation but I was waiting on them to send me a response saying it was an error. Instead, they responded with a the information I needed to provide them with a schedule and so on. I was so appalled. Compared to what I want it to be, my magazine is so small, so this is a big deal to me. It is free publicity!
   The second event was tonight just as I was laying down after saying my prayers, something told me to check my emails. I was so surprised to see, that a publicist from California had contacted me about featuring her client. She had even attached an extensive portfolio with it. I was so flattered, and the real kicker was the client is a motivational speaker! Honestly not even three full hours ago, I was looking for a motivational speaker to network with, because am interested in speaking.
   When I first started dancing, I said I would only dance two years, because I had no intentions of making that into a career. My two years were up October 1, so I have been trying to decide what I am going to do. Since I am now in school and publishing a magazine, I really do not have time for another job, but I am tired of dancing and trying to explain to people. I have been toying with the idea of speaking about my experiences, which is why I was looking for someone with knowledge in this field, so I strongly feel that this is a message as well.
   I assume some people are thinking these are such small events that they could mean anything, but to me, someone who had really lost faith, they meant so much. Knowing me, I am sure I was on the verge of trying something I would regret. Maybe God knew that too. Thank you Lorna for inspiring me, and I am so proud to say God has not forgotten about me.