Just sharing.

[beensetfree]

Facing Her Past


Tracy Dawn screamed and tried to fight off her attacker. But the guy was too strong, too determined.
At 17, during the summer of her senior year, she was raped.

Christian rock artist Tracy Dawn Klaiber—who goes by Tracy Dawn—can't exactly remember how they'd met. Maybe it was at a football game the previous fall. She's not sure. But she'd seen him here and there a few times. There seemed to be a mutual attraction. And it was cool that an "older guy"—21 years old, to be exact—was interested in her.

So one day in late summer, she drove over to his condo in a neighboring town. The plan was to take in a movie or maybe go out for a nice dinner. But the guy had different plans.

After the rape, she shook uncontrollably and her screams-turned-to-shrieks became unbearable to her rapist. He decided to leave her there, alone in his condo.

With her attacker gone, the girl's pain and fear spiraled into rage. She felt like she'd explode. Then she spied a collection of empty bottles. She grabbed one, smashed it. Then another. And another. She smashed every single bottle, leaving the apartment trashed with shards of shattered glass.

She got back in her car and started driving. She stopped somewhere, changed into the jogging outfit she kept in her trunk, and ran. She ran long and hard. She ran until sweat soaked her clothes and exhaustion drained her of any remaining energy. Yet as hard as she tried, she could not run away from the fact that she'd just been raped.

Tracy Dawn is now able to talk openly about the horrible attack. The singer/songwriter even wrote a song about it for her debut CD Poetic Aftermath (Atlantic), a rock album packed with gritty testimonials about the life-changing power of God. But when the rape took place, and for several years afterward, she kept her secret buried deep down inside.

"I was a virgin when I was raped," she explains. "I didn't know anything about sex. I really didn't understand what had happened. I just knew I was in pain. …

"I was afraid to talk to anybody about it. I thought I'd be blamed for what happened. I figured I was so stupid to trust him. I should have known better. I should have seen it coming."

So Tracy Dawn decided to pretend like the rape never took place. She now realizes she should have gone to the police. She should have told somebody. But she didn't. She simply tried to hide her pain by throwing herself into her role as head cheerleader and lead soloist of many high school choral productions.

But her performances at sporting events and music programs were simply that—performances. She couldn't perform away the bitterness and anger that festered inside. Her self-worth wasted away, as did her faith in God. While she'd grown up in a Christian home and made a profession of faith at age 5, she decided God had abandoned her. So why not abandon him?

"I'd gotten coldhearted," she says. "Not long after the rape, I said that's it. I don't care about any of this Christian or church stuff anymore. This is meaningless. I only kept going to church because my parents made me."

As she turned away from her faith, she turned toward friends who introduced her to alcohol and marijuana. She tried to drink and smoke away the pain that overwhelmed her.

Amid all of this pain, or maybe because of it, she dreamed big about her future. She fantasized about becoming a model and actress. But more than modeling and acting, she longed to fulfill her dream to become a professional singer and songwriter.

So after high school graduation, 18-year-old Tracy Dawn left home and moved to Los Angeles to pursue her dreams. Sure, her dreams were far-fetched. What were the odds of a naive high school grad from smalltown Kansas—completely on her own with no training or experience—breaking into the entertainment world? Maybe this happens in made-for-TV movies. But not in reality.

But she was determined, hard working, focused. Obviously, she was motivated by more than career goals. If she kept busy enough, if she crammed enough things into her life, she'd bury a past nightmare.

"I just never let myself think about the rape," she says.

After a couple years of struggling to make ends meet, she started landing some jobs. There were commercials for Miller Lite, McDonald's, Coke and MCI. There was a modeling gig with Calvin Klein. And with a prominent part as a waitress in the Guns N' Roses video, "November Rain," she found herself on MTV. As for her music career, she'd become a member of a band and was playing some of the better L.A. clubs.

She'd also gotten into the L.A. drug and party scene.

"I'd go with groups of friends to illegal underground parties—raves," she says. "We'd take ecstasy, smoke marijuana, and drink all night long. … Balloons filled with nitrous oxide [laughing gas] were passed around. I became a big nitrous user.

"There were times I'd pass out at these parties. I'd wake up on the ground with someone slapping me in the face to wake me up."

Even with the heavy drug use, Tracy Dawn and her bandmates were looking for something more—a better high. As for Tracy Dawn, she was also looking for a better way to wipe out bad memories. That's when she and the rest of the band started studying sorcery books. Following the instructions in the books, they combined occult rituals with hallucinogenic drugs.

As the sorcery books promised, the spiritual world began to invade her dreams, where she experienced bizarre and frightening visions of satanic activity.

One dream scared her more than any other. "I saw a demon floating above my bed," she says. "I couldn't wake up and get away from the demon."

Then suddenly, while still dreaming, she remembered something her grandmother had told her many years ago.

"When I was real little," says Tracy Dawn, "Grandma told me that if I ever felt like the Devil was attacking me, I could say, 'In the name of Jesus, leave me!' I yelled it out in the dream, and the demon disappeared."

Then she remembers seeing someone she believes represented Jesus. It was then that an inexplicable calmness and peace came over her.
In the days following the dream, she had an insatiable desire to read the Bible. "I started reading Matthew and couldn't stop reading," she says. "My comfort was in reading the Bible. I knew it was the truth."

Soon she found a church and was growing in her Christian walk. She'd given up both sorcery and drug use. And while she still did commercials she felt were appropriate for a Christian, she gave up most modeling jobs. "Calvin Klein modeling was too compromising," she says frankly. "I didn't want to stand in front of people in my underwear anymore."

She even gave up music, feeling it had become too much of a god in her life. "I wanted my identity to be 'Tracy Dawn, child of God.' Not 'Tracy Dawn, singer/songwriter.'"

Then, with all of the "props" gone, she fell into a deep depression.

"I discovered all this pain still in my heart," she explains. "With the drugs and everything else gone, I had nothing left to distract me. I was depressed, and I had lots of suicidal thoughts."

A friend from church helped her find a Christian therapist. Before long, the therapist was helping Tracy Dawn face her past.

"My therapist helped me talk about the rape and other bad experiences," she says. "She helped me put into words feelings I'd buried so long. It was scary. I was afraid of how deep my memories would go and how much they would reveal. At times, I felt that if I allowed myself to feel grief and anguish, I would cry for the rest of my life.

"I had to trust that God really wouldn't give me more than I could handle. I had to lean on the Word of God and prayer."

After about four months of intensive therapy, she began feeling God's healing touch. The past, as horrible as it had been, was finally in the past. It was time to move forward.

Moving forward for Tracy Dawn meant finding her way back to music—something she felt God definitely wanted her to do. It wasn't long before she was writing rock tunes that reflected her faith journey—including these lines about the rape (from "Enter Savior"):

I was raped, I was abused
It left me robbed and confused

Spoke of it to no one—no
Proud of this seeming self-control

Since I didn't let my voice speak
Neither did my eyes weep

So my heart turned hard as glass
In my distress and brokenness

I cried out hoping someone might hear

Enter Savior, enter love
Intervention from above
Enter healer, catcher of my tears
Who whispers in my ear
"Now don't you fear—I'm here"

Enter Savior. Enter love. For Tracy Dawn, a relationship with a loving savior is the only way to find hope and healing. And, she will tell you, it's the only reason to sing about anything.

 

[beensetfree]

Life Sentence

Joe came over to us and said, 'They've seen us and they'll call the police. They've all got to die.'"

Crystal Sturgill pauses and looks across the table. Just to her right is a steel-reinforced window. Outside lies the prison yard, surrounded by two 12-foot fences laced with cruel-looking curls of barbed wire. She wants to continue, but the tears welling in her eyes show how difficult it is for her to relive the memories.

She is soft-spoken and eloquent, hesitant to smile, but genuine, kind and trusting. She hasn't moved from her chair since she started telling me her story 22 hours ago.

Crystal is serving her second year of 3 consecutive life sentences without parole plus 25 years. She is a convicted mass murderer.

She is 21 years old.

"I saw Jason shoot Vidar in the head. Mrs. Lillelid was the next to be shot. … Then there were a bunch of shots. … It seemed like they went on forever. But then they did stop. I was screaming and crying.

"Joe was yelling, 'I can't believe you just did that.' Everyone was screaming."

The crime scene
On April 6, 1997, Crystal and her five friends—Edward Dean Mullins (19 at the time), Natasha Cornett (18), Joe Risner (20), Jason Blake Bryant (14), and Karen Howell (17)—left their rural Kentucky homes, destined for New Orleans.

They spent the morning driving around the county, visiting friends, picking up guns and ammunition, robbing homes and buying drugs.

Once on the road, Joe's car started overheating. They tried to hotwire a car from a used-car lot, but that was unsuccessful. They moved on and kept looking for another vehicle to steal.

Joe's car continued overheating, and they pulled over at a rest stop near Baileyton, Tennessee. While there, Vidar Lillelid—another visitor at the rest stop—approached the teens and asked them if they believed in God.

Crystal and her friends, who were dressed in chains, black clothes and black lipstick, didn't want to hear any talk about God. While Crystal and Dean went back to Joe's car, the others walked toward Vidar's van, which included his wife, Delfina, and their two children, 6-year-old Tabitha and 2-year-old Peter.

Joe decided he and his friends could use Vidar's van. So they'd take it—by force. Joe pulled out a gun and climbed into the van's passenger seat, while his friends piled into the back. Vidar and his family were still in the van.

Joe yelled back to Dean and Crystal to follow them, and then, while wielding his gun, told Vidar to drive away from the rest stop. In that instant, Joe, Crystal and the other teens had gone from highway wanderers to kidnappers, from mere rebels to outright criminals.

Joe and the others forced Vidar to drive the van a few miles to a deserted dirt road while Dean and Crystal followed in Joe's car. Then, everyone got out of the van and stood between the van and the car.

That's when Joe said, "They've seen us and they'll call the police. They've all got to die."

Moments later, Vidar's whole family lay in the m&d in a pool of blood.
Vidar had been shot six times, Delfina eight times. They died holding their critically wounded children. Tabitha died the next day at the hospital; she'd been shot in the head. Peter, who had been shot through the eye, survived.

"We got all our stuff, then we all got into the van and drove as fast as we could," Crystal remembers. "I heard a thump followed by a cracking sound. Only later did I learn that we had run over their bodies."

They continued on to New Orleans, but kept driving … all the way to Mexico. Two days after the murders, they tried to return to the U.S., but police nabbed them at the Arizona border. They were flown back to Tennessee for the trial, where they faced 29 criminal charges, including three counts of first degree murder.

Police took Crystal to the scene of the crime to ask her about what happened.

"It was horrible," she remembers. "I started crying. It was like I could still see those people there. It was like I was reliving it. I saw him shoot that man all over again … "

"We were the outcasts"
At the trial, Natasha, Karen and Joe all testified that Jason was the sole shooter. Jason claimed it was Dean and Joe. All six pleaded guilty. They were all involved.

The media portrayed them as the "vampire cult," and the "occult teen killers." Pictures of their body piercings and gothic clothes flooded newspapers around the world. Bizarre stories of Satanic blood-letting rituals sent ripples of horror throughout the nation.

Crystal maintains that they didn't drink blood or worship Satan. But, she says, "We dressed in black so we'd stand out. And we did self-mutilation. We were the freaks, the outcasts."

She and her friends used drugs, cut themselves with razor blades, read books of spells and called on demons. They were into witchcraft and the occult. They used Ouija boards and consulted tarot cards and horoscopes.

"We were trying to find answers," Crystal says. "We all had been to church. It didn't provide answers. We were interested in Wicca, books on witches and spells. We were anarchists."

Crystal admits that after a while, she and her friends wanted to be the outcasts, but not at first. At first all they wanted was for people to care about them and accept them, even though they were different.

After Crystal and her friends were arrested and brought back to Tennessee, more than 200 people met them at the prison. "We got to the jail and there was a mob scene. There were TV cameras and bright lights that hurt my eyes. Someone pushed me and called me Charles Manson's daughter."

Crystal was suicidal when she first arrived at the jail. She was sent to her cell for two days without a mattress, or a blanket. And then, a few days later, Crystal learned from her lawyers that the prosecuting attorney was seeking the death sentence for her and the other three who were over 18.

She was all alone in prison. Even though she'd gone to church, sung in the choir, and attended youth group, none of it had impacted her deep inside. Crystal had no hope for the future, nowhere to turn

A letter of hope
Crystal soon started getting mail.

"All I got was hate mail," she says. "My lawyers have boxes of letters. Everyone wrote that they hoped I fried and they wrote, 'the wages of sin is death.' But they left out the last half of the verse, that 'the gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord.' "

Finally she got a letter from Jack Bruce, a pastor in Elizabethton, Tennessee, who wrote:

I realize that you may feel as if everyone is against you. I want you to know that it is not true. There are those of us in Tennessee who care for you and are concerned about you. I, for one, am concerned for your well-being.

From my study of the Bible, I can assure you that nothing you have ever done, thought or said is so bad that it will keep God from extending to you his forgiveness. No one has strayed too far to be forgiven. He is very willing to welcome you back to him. I would love to tell you about it.
Those caring words moved Crystal deeply. A couple of weeks later she wrote him back and invited him to meet with her. In jail, Pastor Bruce led her to a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

Crystal still remembers the immediate change in her life. "Pastor Bruce came in and we talked for a couple of hours. We prayed together. I felt different right away. And over the next few days I read the Bible continuously."

Pastor Bruce, who has since spoken with all the convicted murderers except for Jason, is angry about how Christians responded to the crimes. He encourages believers to reach out to those who are different, or whom we don't understand.

Crystal agrees. "Don't judge those who are different from you. Reach out to them with God's love."

When she went to trial after her conversion, she had a new hope for the future. "I knew I would be in heaven with God if they killed me. And if they didn't, I would do his work here on earth."

Not a day goes by that Crystal doesn't think of the murders.

"Those people die for me every day," she says. "I only wish I had come to Christ sooner. Maybe I could have touched my friends and stopped this from happening."

We all need grace
When Crystal first went to prison, she was scared. She knew she'd be living with rapists, robbers and murderers. But after attending one of the church services in prison, she saw her fellow inmates in a different light.

"Everyone has done bad things," says Crystal. "Even Moses. I never knew Moses was a murderer. The people in the Bible weren't perfect, either."

Crystal wants to spread the word that those in prison and those outside of its walls are not that much different—we are all sinners in need of God's grace. She once wrote in a letter that she wants to "banish the stigmatization that … criminals are beyond the realm of salvation and Christ's glory."

"Don't think God won't love you if you've done something," Crystal says. "He loves us with our faults. He knows we can't be perfect, and he'll blot out all our transgressions. … God doesn't love me any less than he loves you and he doesn't love the preacher any more than he loves me."

When Crystal and her friends pleaded guilty, the death sentence was waived, and they were instead given life without parole. Her case is under appeal, and Crystal hopes that one day she will be released from prison.

"I think God has more for me than this," she says, "but if not, I pray that I'll serve him wherever I'm at. If I touch just one person in this place, then it's a miracle."

 

[beensetfree]

Two Homeless Girls

I was sprawled on my stomach on the church floor, concentrating on the picture forming beneath my hands. Should I add an extra tulip to the bouquet in my picture?

"What should I draw?" a young voice inquired. I leaned over to face 6-year-old Adrianna beside me. With tiny fingers she pushed her brown bangs back from her eyes and smiled a smile that would have stolen the heart of the crabbiest old crone.

Her 8-year-old sister, Holly, was nearby, busily scribbling on her paper. They were among the seven kids who had come for Vacation Bible School that cloudy Monday morning.

"Why don't you draw your house?" I asked Adrianna. She looked at me in bewilderment. "We don't have a house," she said. "We live in a truck."

My close friend Erin and I exchanged puzzled glances. Was this just the wild imagination of a 6-year-old, or was it true?

A little investigation proved Adrianna's claim. After talking with the church pianist, I discovered Adrianna and Holly's family had appeared in town two weeks ago. They lived with their parents and their two dogs in an old, battered van. The church was paying for them to stay in the trailer park across town, while their father found work picking fruit in area orchards.

Now I knew why Adrianna's shoes were too small and why Holly wore only sandals even on chilly days. I could understand why their clothes were worn and shabby.

As I talked with them during the week, I discovered their mother was teaching them to read. Always on the go, the girls had never attended school and had never formed any long-lasting friendships with other children. That explained their timidity during playtime. Rather than joining in the games, they preferred to sit on the sidelines and watch.

But they did get very close to me. When our group went to the elementary school grounds to use the baseball field, the three of us would stay at the playground.

I pushed Adrianna and Holly around and around on the tire swing until I was dizzy from watching them, yet they always pleaded for more pushes. They'd take turns sitting securely in my lap on the slide. I gave piggyback rides. We played hopscotch and "house."

Adrianna and Holly's version of "house" was sitting in the wooden playground Jeep suspended by springs. The game consisted of stopping at different places. The game said a lot about the life these girls lived. They knew nothing of having a bed, a bathroom or kitchen.

When I'd read them Bible stories during our teaching time, I never knew how much of the stories they grasped. But both girls were quiet and happy when allowed to sit in a lap. One afternoon Adrianna handed me a little plastic comb she had won earlier that day for answering a question.

During the Bible story, Adrianna sat without moving a muscle as I patiently worked through the snarls in her long brown hair. For 20 minutes she absorbed each stroke as though she had never experienced such unhurried care.

On Friday night, the last evening of our VBS, I met Mr. and Mrs. Portz, Adrianna and Holly's parents. Mr. Portz was friendly enough, but Mrs. Portz seemed distant and withdrawn.

She didn't talk much and sat in a corner with a plate of refreshments, eating as though it were her last meal. She laughed nervously and didn't meet my eyes once. At the end of the meal time, Mr. Portz painstakingly saved some leftover cookies and cake in a plastic bag.

After the night's events, I walked with them over to their dirty, beat-up van. As I approached, a German shepherd stuck its head out the window and growled at me. Mr. Portz shouted a command and the animal disappeared. Before they drove off, Mr. Portz pressed a plastic bag into my hands.

"They're good plums," he told me. "I just got them this morning. Picked them myself. We'll get more soon."

The plums looked overripe and bruised, but I knew it was his way of saying, "Thank you for what you did this week. Thank you for loving my girls."

I boosted the girls into the back of the van as Mr. Portz tried to get it started. The motor groaned and coughed, then finally turned over. As they drove out of the gravel driveway, I saw Adrianna and Holly waving with all their might through the side window.

Tears stung my eyes. Tonight I would be warm and sleeping snugly, while those girls would cook over a fire and sleep in a cold van. Perhaps tomorrow they would leave this town and head for another, so their father could keep food in their mouths and clothes on their backs.

I think of those girls every day. I pray they will be warm and dry, that they will not be hungry, and that they will be able to go to school. I pray they will meet others who will show them the love of Jesus like we did that short week in July, and that one day they will trust Jesus with their lives.

 

[beensetfree]

On A Mission

More than anything, Matthew Littlefield wants to get cancer.

No, it's not what you think. He's already been there, done that. He's already had cancer.

Now he just wants to get it, to really get it—to stalk it, corner it, slam it up against the wall, beat it to a pulp and leave it there, wasted and dying.

"I would love nothing more than to find a cure for cancer," says Matthew, 22.

Who can blame him? After all, it's like the dreaded disease has been stalking him for most of his life.

First, when Matthew was 4, it threatened to take his mom. She ultimately beat it, and has been cancer-free ever since, but Matthew has never forgotten how it tore her down and wore her out.

Right after that, the family's Dalmatian got cancer and died.

Then, when Matthew was in junior high, a couple of his friends got cancer; one of them died. Another friend's mom got it and died.

And after all that, it was Matthew's turn to get it. It happened just a few years ago, when Matthew was a college sophomore. His mom, a registered nurse, noticed a weird-looking mole on Matthew's arm. She sent him to the doc for some tests. Turned out to be a melanoma, an aggressive cancer that can kill in a hurry once it gets into your system.

Fortunately, they caught it in time and cut out the mole before its cancer cells went on their lethal rampage. Just to be sure they got it all, doctors cut out a lot of other moles from Matthew's back and shoulders.

"Looked like I'd been shot with a shotgun," says Matthew, now a senior at Vanguard University in California. "I have a high tolerance for pain, but that was pretty uncomfortable. But I never really freaked out about getting cancer. I just said, 'Well, God, I guess you want to teach me something. Whatever it is, I'll learn from it.'"

Probably the biggest thing he learned was that he wants to wipe the disease from the face of the earth. After running from cancer all these years, Matthew figures it's his turn to be the aggressor.

That's why, when he graduates from Vanguard in May, he hopes to move on to medical school, where he plans to study to be a pediatric oncologist—a cancer doc for kids.

It's not a recent decision. When he was 4 years old, Matthew knew what he wanted to be when he grew up. And he's stuck with that decision all along, forging ahead with the relentless focus of a guy on one mega-serious mission.

While his elementary school friends griped about science class, Matthew seized it like a lifeline, figuring it was just the first of many steps toward someday becoming Doctor Matthew Littlefield.

He loved high school bio and chem, and he's still loving the sciences at Vanguard.

"I felt so helpless"
Matthew's journey started when his mom was diagnosed with breast cancer almost 19 years ago.

"At that time," says Matthew, "I didn't know what cancer was, or what it could do to people. All I knew was that Mom didn't feel well, and all of her hair fell out, and she had to wear a wig whenever she went out of the house. I just wanted to make her feel better, but I felt so helpless."
Matthew clearly remembers the moment he decided what he'd do with the rest of his life.

"Mom had an IV that went into one of the major arteries in her chest," he says. "My dad had to change the dressing on that every day. I remember wanting to help, but I couldn't do anything. The only thing I could do was sit on the bed and hold Mom's hand while Dad changed the dressing.

"I wasn't grossed out by it, which I guess is really weird at 4 years old. But I remember thinking, When I get older, I'm going to be able to do more than just sit and watch. I'm going to be able to do something to actually help. That's when I decided to become a doctor."

A mastectomy and chemotherapy successfully purged Mrs. Littlefield's cancer, and she's been fine ever since. But Matthew's personal quest had begun, and he's never lost his focus.

Other than cancer, Matthew has had two other brushes with death, both of them leaving their mark.

When he was 10, his older brother Jimmy, who was 16 at the time, almost died from a freak reaction to mononucleosis.

"We were on vacation," Matthew says, "and Jimmy woke up one night and his throat was killing him. We took him to a hospital, and they couldn't figure out what was wrong. He started having excruciating abdominal pain and a really high fever. Then he started hallucinating—talking to people who weren't there, and petting an imaginary dog.

"They flew him down to another hospital, and he stayed there for 10 days. He ended up going into major liver failure and almost died. The doctors said there was nothing they could do to save him. But a few days later he got better, and he lived. The doctors said it was a miracle."

Then, when Matthew was 16, his next-door neighbors, two teen girls, were killed in an automobile accident.

"I was like most kids are, thinking they're going to live forever," he says. "But that accident shook me up, and made me realize I had to live the way God wants me to. I believed in Jesus, but I had been straying from the path."

Chasing a cure
Seeing death up close and personal not only helped Matt get more serious about his faith, but it also intensified his determination to kick cancer into oblivion—and help young patients while he's at it.

"I love working with kids," Matthew says. "Always have, always will."

He believes it won't be long before he can tell kids that they've found a way to kill one of the world's most-feared killers.

"I think we'll have a cure for cancer within the next 10 years," Matthew says. "And I'd love to be on the team that finds the cure."

If and when that happens, this much is for sure: Matthew Littlefield will be more than ready to get cancer—to get it real good, once and for all.

 

[beensetfree]

On My Own

He was 16, living on his own, 600 miles from home, chasing his boyhood dream of playing professional hockey. No parents to answer to, no curfews, no rules. Just hotels and buses and ice rinks and girls. And beer, lots of beer.

But Shane Doan would have none of that stuff. Loose living just didn't fit his moral code. Besides, Shane was all business. He just wanted to play the game. Just give the guy a stick and a puck, and for the most part, he was OK.

But he missed home. He missed Mom and Dad. He missed his brother and sister. He missed Red Wing, his horse back at Circle Square, the ranch where he grew up.

Circle Square Ranch, a Christian camp for kids of all ages, sits on 360 beautiful acres of prairie in Alberta, Canada. There's horseback riding, swimming, riflery, archery, an obstacle course, and campfires every summer night.

Shane's parents ran the place. And Shane ran all over it.

"The ranch was everything a kid could want, the perfect place to grow up," says Shane, who now plays for the National Hockey League's Phoenix Coyotes. "And all in a Christian environment. What more could you ask?"

That's why Shane was so homesick at 16, even with his NHL hopes coming closer all the time. He was in the city of Kamloops, British Columbia, 11 hours from the ranch, to play junior hockey—a big deal in Canada, and often a step to playing professionally.

"I Just Said No"
Shane was pretty much on his own in Kamloops, where some of his teammates liked to party hardy and pick up girls who had a thing for hockey players.

"We were kind of the celebrities of the town," Shane says. "It was pretty easy to get away with just about anything."

Shortly after he arrived in Kamloops, some of his teammates asked Shane to join the gang for a night on the town.

Shane didn't even have to think about it.

"I just flat out said no," he says. "A couple of the guys said, 'Well, everybody's going.' But I stood my ground. My 'no' meant 'no.' And because of that, nobody really asked me anymore."

Shane, who became a Christian when he was 12, says it was important for him to take a stand for his beliefs right from the start.

"It was the first time I really had to stand on my own," he says. "I had to do what I knew was right. I couldn't say, 'Well, my parents won't let me, so I can't,' because they weren't there. I had to decide: Was Christianity my own belief, or just something I got from my parents?"

Shane didn't condemn his partying friends or start preaching at them. He just stood up for what he knew was right—and against what he knew was wrong.

He's always been that way. He wants people to know right off the bat where he draws the line.

"When you're with somebody new, when the first test comes, that's a critical moment," Shane says. "If you can take a stand that first time, it makes each time after that easier and easier.

"If you fold on that first time, your friends will remember that, and they'll keep testing you. But if you take a stand from the beginning, they won't keep testing you. Being that way has helped me in a lot of areas."
A Big Kid at Heart
Shane wants to pass that wisdom on to the campers at Circle Square Ranch. He not only lived there, but worked there as a teenager, serving as a counselor or teaching horsemanship, or wherever he was needed most.

Since making it to the NHL in 1995, Shane still returns to Circle Square every summer after the hockey season ends. (He did miss last summer because his wife Andrea had just given birth to a baby girl, Gracie. But he'll be back at the ranch this summer.)

"I love going back there," Shane says. "And I love working with the kids."

Shane's mom says her son is "a big kid at heart. Kids love being around him. He loves to play games, and loves for the kids to have fun. His attitude is that life is to be enjoyed."

Shane has a few favorite stories about being a camp counselor at Circle Square, but one especially stands out—one where Shane may have learned more from the camper than the camper did from him.

"I've seen a lot of campers come and go, and I've seen a lot of changed lives," he says. "But a few summers ago, when I was 19, this kid named Brendan was in my group. Brendan was 12. He had no legs, but he was amazing. He didn't use a wheelchair, but he got around everywhere, mostly on his hands. It was unbelievable.

"Brendan did not have one ounce of self-pity, and he didn't want anyone feeling sorry for him. He would do anything everybody else did—and try to beat them at it. That was neat for me to see, a real inspiration."

God's in Control
Shane sometimes thinks of Brendan when things aren't going well for him on the ice.

His first four years in the NHL haven't been as good as he had hoped. He's been a good player for the Coyotes, but not a star. He hasn't scored as many points (a combination of goals and assists) as he would have hoped. And that has been frustrating.

"I've had some struggles offensively," says Shane, a 6-foot-2, 215-pound power forward. "My career so far hasn't been what I'd call an extreme success. I've had success in spurts, but in general, I haven't had the numbers that I'd like."

As a result of those struggles, and to keep things in perspective, Shane writes Romans 8:28 on all his hockey sticks: "And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."

"I talked to my family and my wife about my struggles," he says. "They reminded me that in all things, God works for good. I mean, even if I have no points, God is still in control of everything.

"When I finally started to grasp that, it kind of took the pressure off, because it had been building to the point where I didn't enjoy playing as much anymore. So I decided that even if I score no more goals for the rest of my career, God is still working for the good of those who love him and seek his purpose."

And what's God's purpose for Shane after hockey?

"I think I want to work with kids," he says. "I enjoy that very much. And doing that kind of keeps you young yourself."

Somewhere, some day, some 16-year-old who's been to Circle Square Ranch will be faced with temptation, and he'll decide to walk away from it.

And he'll at least partly have Shane to thank for making that choice. Because that's just what Shane did.

 

[beensetfree]

Forever Friends

IT'S BEEN NEARLY A YEAR since Amanda last visited with her best friend Cassie.

It was a Tuesday morning, right after their first-hour photography class. Cassie was worried about her outfit. "I can't believe I wore this shirt," she told Amanda. "It looks terrible on me."

Amanda reassured her, told her she looked beautiful, told her she loved her, and told her she'd see her later, probably during lunch, when they usually studied together in the library.

"She looked so pretty," Amanda tells me. "She was one of the most beautiful people I knew. But that was so like Cassie—to be unsure about how she looked. She was so normal, wanting to fit in, wanting to have friends."

Amanda Meyer and I are sitting at the cafe in a Barnes & Noble in Littleton, Colorado. She is telling me about Cassie Bernall, her best friend.

We're not very far from Columbine High School, where Amanda is now a senior and where, on April 20, 1999, two students gunned down a dozen classmates—including Cassie—and a teacher before killing themselves.

Almost everyone knows about Cassie. How she died after being shot in the library at Columbine. How she, according to many reports, said "yes" when asked if she believed in God. How she lived a good life after being rescued from a dark past that included a time when she dabbled in Satanism, wrote letters about killing her parents, and swore she'd never turn to God.

A true best friend
We know a lot of facts and tidbits about Cassie. But those facts and tidbits don't have much lasting importance.

When Jesus sat with his disciples, taught the crowds, and visited one-on-one with people, he was pretty clear about one thing. Relationships are what count—relationships with God and relationships with others.

Amanda and Cassie knew how important relationships could be. Each of them had a relationship with God, and that became the foundation of their relationship with each other. That's how they built a true friendship.

Amanda has talked about Cassie quite a bit in the last year. To newspapers and magazines. To Oprah. To 20/20.

But I don't want to know just about Cassie. I want to know about Cassie and Amanda together. I want to know about their relationship, what it's like to have a true best friend.

So Amanda tells me.

"There was a Bible Club party the end of my sophomore year," she says. "I was hesitant about going because I hardly knew anyone except Amy, who gave me a ride. It was going to be a huge game of Capture the Flag. I was assigned to guard my team's flag with Cassie, a girl I recognized from school but didn't know.

"We devised this great place to hide the flag, right behind a tree. It was perfect." Amanda smiles.

"Then we just had to sit and wait for people to come after the flag, so we had lots of time to talk. It was small talk at first, the typical things."

But the small talk quickly changed into more. Amanda and Cassie heard that someone had gotten hurt in the game. It was Amy, Amanda's ride. She'd had a severe reaction to a bee sting.

"It was scary," Amanda says. "The ambulance came. Amy's parents came. It was obviously a serious thing. I remember thinking, This can't be happening. Cassie sat with me on the lawn away from everyone else, and I said, 'What if she dies?'"

Cassie answered from her heart: "Then she'll be in a better place."

Amanda says, "I'd met this girl only a half-hour earlier, and already we were talking about heaven. Cassie sang me the Jars of Clay song, 'Love Song for a Savior,' that talks about a girl running to Christ and falling into his arms. She said that's what she wanted—to run to God in heaven."

Cassie gave Amanda a ride home that night.

"I told her I was so excited to meet her," says Amanda.

"Yeah, me too," is what Cassie said back.

Friendships are strange things. Each one is different—has its own personality, its own character, and its own pace. Amanda and Cassie's started in a single night, and it was stronger after a few short hours than some friendships are after many weeks and months.

So much in common
Their friendship continued to grow, and one night several months later, after the start of their junior year, it went to an even deeper level.

"We went to dinner at a Chinese restaurant," Amanda remembers. "After ward, we took a long drive, and she told me about her past, all the bad stuff she'd been into, all the hard times with her friends and her parents, all the pain. In some ways, it was hard to believe, because she seemed so strong. In another way, I wasn't surprised. We've all done things we regret. We all have a past. I'd been through some bad things, too."

By then, Amanda and Cassie were about as tight as two friends can get.

"When second semester of our junior year rolled around, we had some of the same classes," says Amanda. "We could work on projects together, help each other with homework, and hang out more and more."

They discovered just how much they had in common.

"We both wanted to be doctors. We both dreamed of going to Cambridge. We both liked the same foods. We both had the same fears about school and guys and life in general. It seemed like everything I said, she agreed with. Everything I thought, she thought, too. I'd never had a friend so much like me."

But that wasn't what really drew them together. It was something much deeper.

"It was totally a two-way friendship," says Amanda. "Cassie didn't just dump on me. I didn't just dump on her. She came to me with problems. She listened to my advice. I felt like I could really help. And vice versa.

"A lot of people I know will sit and listen to my problems, try to help me out. But I want to know that they trust me enough to share their problems with me, too."

This surprises me. In my experience, a lot of people want to talk, but few want to listen. I think what made this friendship so special is that it was comprised of two people whose first thought wasn't, "Does this person care enough about me to listen to my problems?" but rather "Does this person trust me enough to tell me what she's going through?"
"I think about her living"
The last weekend Amanda and Cassie spent together was all about being a good friend.

"It was prom weekend, and neither of us had dates. So we decided to work together at a fund-raising banquet for a youth group. It was at this huge hotel, and after we were done serving the meal, we wandered around the entire place. We rode the elevators. We checked out all the nooks and crannies."

They talked. They laughed. They cried. They giggled. They shared things they'd never told anyone else before, not even each other.

"There are lots of layers to a friendship," says Amanda. "That night, we took off every mask we ever wore. We talked about silly and stupid fears, but also real fears. It affirmed me so much to know that she had the same struggles I did."

And then they went to an after-prom party, where they spent long hours together having fun, being best friends.

On Monday morning, they went back to school. Same on Tuesday morning, the day Cassie worried about her shirt, the day Amanda told her she was beautiful.

By Tuesday afternoon, everything was tragically different.

"I don't think about Cassie dying," Amanda says quietly. "I think about her living. I think about what it was like to be with her and to talk with her. She is special to me because of our friendship, not because of her death."

Those words stick with me as I leave Littleton and return to my Midwest home.

Friendship is what mattered most to Amanda and Cassie. And not just any friendship, but a vibrant relationship that went far beyond the superficial and into the depths of the supernatural, thanks to their shared faith.

Theirs was a relationship we can all learn from.

 

[beensetfree]

Plane Crash!

it was truly a dark and stormy night when the jet approached the runway—so dark and stormy that Misha Perkins wondered if she'd live to see light of the next day.

"I could hear the thunder, and I could feel the wind whipping the plane around," says Misha, a senior at Ouachita Baptist University. "I knew we were going to crash."

Misha thought of her parents, her friends, and her boyfriend, who was waiting at the airport. She wondered if she'd ever see any of them again.

She was right about the crash. American Airlines Flight 1420, landing at midnight on June 1, 1999, in Little Rock, Arkansas, lost control and raced off the end of the runway, slamming into two steel posts, breaking off the left wing and chopping the plane in half. Ten people died.

Misha was one of the 135 fortunate survivors—including about 20 members of a Ouachita Baptist choir that had just finished a European concert tour.

One choir member, senior James Harrison, died at the scene. Witnesses said James had escaped, but died when he went back on the burning plane to help others get off (see "A True Servant," below).

James wasn't the only Ouachita student who thought of others first. Many choir members—including Misha—did the same.

We talked to four students who survived the crash. Here are their stories:

"Not a vacation"
When Misha Perkins signed up for the Ouachita Singers choir trip, she wanted to "sing for the Lord."

"This wasn't going to be a vacation," says Misha, a senior music education major from Garland, Texas. "This was a missions trip."

But she couldn't have known her best opportunity to do God's work would come in the midst of the burning wreckage at the end of an Arkansas runway.

When the plane crashed, she says, "there was chaos. People were screaming."

But Misha kept her wits.

"I was out of that seat belt before we even stopped," she says, "thinking about what I was going to do next. I believe the Holy Spirit calmed me."

Misha escaped through the emergency door and stepped right into the howling winds of a raging thunderstorm. Then it started hailing.

"I had to laugh," she says."I mean, we've just been in a plane crash, we're in a storm in the middle of this field, and now it's going to hail? Give me a break! "

Then Misha saw her best friend, Kristin Maddox, on her knees.

"She was kind of out of it," says Misha. "She looked at me and said, ‘Misha, I think my skin is falling off.'

"We prayed. I tried to shield her from the rain. I took off my windbreaker and put it over her. Then somebody else screamed for help." (Kristin's arms and hands were badly burned, but she is now on the road to recovery.)

Misha then turned to a severely injured man nearby.

"All I know is his name was Fred, and all of his insides were on the outside," Misha says. "His intestines were spilling out. Somebody said, ‘Fred's in shock. We've got to keep him warm.'

"I was soaking wet and cold, but I knew I could provide warmth in the form of body heat. So I climbed on top of him, put my arms around him and held him close.

"He was shaking real badly. I couldn't imagine the pain he was in. We prayed together and sang ‘Amazing Grace.'"

When rescue vehicles arrived about 10 minutes later, they took Fred away. Misha says Fred is now "doing very well, which makes me happy."

Why did she choose to come to Fred's aid like that?

"Why wouldn't I?" she says. "Someone needed to, and I was there. I never thought about not doing it."

Eventually, buses arrived on the scene and survivors were taken indoors, where Misha found her boy friend, Matt Parker. Matt was so thankful Misha was unhurt that he proposed to her the very next day.

Misha didn't necessarily appreciate the timing of his proposal.

"I was pretty much out of it," she says. "But I guess Matt couldn't bear the thought of losing me. He'd forgotten, unfortunately, that I couldn't even make a little decision that day, much less a big one.

"So, I accepted his proposal, but I was very cold, the Ice Queen. I said, ‘Yes, Matt, I will marry you because I had planned to marry you before the plane crash. And it only makes sense that I would still want to marry you now. Pardon me if I don't get all excited right now, but that's because I can't feel anything.'

"Oh, it crushed him. So, a few weeks later, he re-proposed. Came up and surprised me with a ring."

The wedding is June 24.

"I'm going to die"
When the jet finally came to a stop, Luke Hollingsworth, sitting near the back, couldn't see the damage ahead.

"I didn't think it was that big of a deal," says Luke, a senior from Jonesboro, Arkansas, who's majoring in church music and music education. "I was like, ‘OK, we've crashed, but we're on the ground, so it can't be that bad.' I didn't know the plane had been ripped in half."

Luke may have been calm, but the people around him weren't. The rear exit wouldn't open, and people panicked, screaming and climbing over one another. Luke tried to calm them down.

"I raised my voice and told people to settle down, 'cause the lady behind me was trapped under her seat," he says. "They calmed down for a second and I helped get her up."

Then the cabin filled with smoke.

"I pulled my shirt up over my face so I could breathe a little," Luke says. "That's when I actually thought, Well, God, I guess this is it. I guess I'm going to die of smoke inhalation or fire. But I was like, God, I'm ready. Take me home."

Luke is surprised at how calm he was.

"It's not like I'm some super Christian," he says. "But it's like the Bible says: I had that peace that passeth all understanding" (Philippians 4:7).

Then the smoke began to clear. Someone had barely opened the rear exit, and people started squeezing out.

Once outside, Luke pulled on the door to make a bigger opening.

"I held it open with one hand while I was pulling other people out with the other," he says. "About 15 or 20 people came out behind me, and then I went back in to make sure that was everybody."

Once he saw that the back of the plane was empty, Luke joined the others in getting away from the wreckage. But he wasn't done yet.

The plane had come to a stop in a marsh next to the Arkansas River, and to get away, many survivors had to walk through chest-high water. Luke carried some of them across the water, including a woman with a broken leg.

Luke says the crash "taught me that life is a precious gift we all take for granted. And nothing matters except that we know Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior.

"I have some non-Christian friends who know they're living wrong, but they're like, ‘I'll only do this for a little while and then I'll change.' People think they have all the time in the world. But then something like this happens. We are not guaranteed tomorrow."

"I felt at peace"
Allison Hunt felt like she was in a movie.

"It didn't seem real," says Allison, a junior musical theater major from Jonesboro, Arkansas. "I guess you think of the possibility of being in a plane crash, but it's never a reality. Then all of a sudden, it was. When I realized the plane was on fire, I thought I was going to die. We had survived this crash, and then I thought the plane would explode like in a movie.

"But I felt at peace. I didn't want to die. I didn't want to go through any pain. But I wasn't scared to die, because I knew where I'd go if I did, and I knew God would take care of me no matter what."

Allison tried to calm down others, too.

"People around me were panicking," she says. "I kind of grabbed their shoulders and looked in their eyes and said, ‘Just stay calm.'"

While Allison waited for the line of people trying to get off the plane to start moving, she grabbed her violin case off the floor. Then the line started moving, and a few minutes later, she was off the plane, running for her life.

Her story was reported in USA Today. Angry letters poured in from people criticizing Allison for grabbing her violin.

"People said I endangered lives, that no luggage is worth the price of a life," says Allison, stung by the criticism. "But it didn't happen like that. If I thought it was going to impair anyone getting off, I would have dropped it in a moment."

As soon as she got away from the plane, Allison dropped to her knees and thanked God.

"I was just overwhelmed with gratefulness that I had been spared and that God had gotten us through a terrible situation," she says. "I just realized how good it felt to be alive."

Allison then went to help a flight attendant who suffered a concussion.

"I was trying to keep her conscious," she says. "She started to drift away several times. Then she got on the ambulance."

Since the crash, Allison has been "trying to understand the reasons things like this happen. I've been reading a lot, like C.S. Lewis' The Problem of Pain. I realize that the Son of God suffered unto death not that men might not suffer, but that their suffering might be like his."

"I felt numb"
When he got off the plane, Tad Hardin immediately thought of his fiancee, who was waiting at the airport, and his wedding, which was just 11 days away.

"I knew my fiancee would really appreciate me being alive to be at the wedding," laughs Tad, a piano performance major from Arkadelphia, Arkansas, who graduated in June and is now pursuing a master's degree at Florida State University. "But then I started worrying about the condition of others."

Tad had helped some people around him get off the plane, and once they got to safety, he thanked God for saving his life.

Since then, Tad has seen his friends and fellow survivors deal with "a whole spectrum of emotions."

"Some feel guilt," he says. "Some wish they could feel. Some haven't cried, and they don't feel like that's healthy. Some have struggled with sleep. Some have felt very numb to the whole experience. That's where I've been; it's sort of surreal. You don't realize you actually went through it."

Eleven days later, Tad and his fiancee married, then left for their honeymoon in Mexico—on a plane.

"I wasn't afraid to be on the plane," Tad says. "But I was afraid when we landed. But it went pretty smooth."

Tad says whenever he flies now, he listens to the flight attendants' safety speech, reads the safety card and identifies the emergency exits.

"I pay attention to all that now," he says. "I make sure I know where I would need to go if it did crash. I know the odds are slim-to-none I'll be in two crashes in one lifetime, but that doesn't matter. I'm going to be prepared."

In the days immediately after the crash, Tad gave more than 20 interviews to reporters. He appreciated the chance to talk about his faith to the media.

"In a tragedy, you want to look for the ways God can make good out of it," he says. "It was good to tell reporters about having faith even through tough times, because if you can't have faith in the bad times, why have faith at all?

"Some Christians might say about the plane crash, ‘It must be God's will.' But I don't believe that. I don't believe God made the plane crash. I don't believe a loving, gracious God would do that. I think God allows humans to make mistakes, and those mistakes can affect others.

"People can drink too much, get in a car and hurt people. And people can fly a plane and think they can land, and they may make a mistake. That's what happened. God allows us to make mistakes and suffer the consequences and learn from them."

 

[beensetfree]

She Needed Jesus

Es loco! Es loco!" Five little brown hands covered five giggling mouths. Apparently, these clamoring little girls who wanted to "help" me paint their bedroom in the orphanage hadn't understood a word of my broken Spanish. Whatever I had said must have sounded pretty weird, because now they were calling me crazy.

Eight months earlier, I was feeling pretty crazy as I sat in a planning meeting for our two-week trip to Maracay, Venezuela. I was only 14. I'd never even been out of the Midwest without my parents, let alone gone to another country. And I wasn't at all sure how to share the gospel with people who'd never heard it. I wondered what I was getting myself into.

When I first arrived in Venezuela, I felt like I was in paradise. Little brown children with gorgeous black hair swarmed all around me, begging for my attention. They loved to give me hugs and sit on my lap, and they were desperate to be held and loved. I sure wasn't complaining about that!

I love kids, and these were some of the most lovable I'd ever met. They didn't whine for toys or grumble about their surroundings. They simply enjoyed life. And though they looked at us, the strange Americans, with wide-eyed fascination, they accepted us as though we had always been there. But we didn't just want the girls to accept us—what we really wanted was for them to accept Jesus.

My two-week missions trip in Maracay opened up a whole new world for me. The members of my church group spent the majority of our time working on the orphanage. The building needed a new roof, a new ceiling and new paint. Despite much rain, sore muscles and any number of dead mice and rats, the structural projects were fairly simple to accomplish. But our real mission—introducing the orphans to the God who loved them—was a bit more challenging.

The 12 little girls at the orphanage had almost nothing—two changes of clothing apiece and a small box of toys for all of them. They all lived together in two rooms, neither one as large as my bedroom at home. Their meals were sparse, and none of them had any extra pounds on their skinny bodies.

But their poverty wasn't what struck me hardest. What truly blew me away was their trust, their openness and their willingness to love and be loved. Each of these girls had faced more hardship in her short five or 10 years than I would in my entire life. Most had been abandoned by their parents, but not one was bitter or angry.

They were mostly happy, content, and thankful to have a home and "sisters." It was obvious to me that God had been protecting these girls all along, preparing their hearts to receive his love from a bunch of "loco" teenagers.

By the second week of our stay with these girls, we had each "adopted" one or two of the girls as our special friends. I'd become quite close to Claudia, a tiny 8-year-old.

She followed me everywhere, getting a big kick out of "helping" me with whatever I was doing, even following me up a ladder to help me clean the rats' nests out from the dropped ceiling. "Loco" continued to be my nickname, and I loved to hear her say it as she waited for me at the gates of the orphanage each morning.

I spent many lunch hours and siesta times with Claudia, reading to her from one of the Bible storybooks we had brought or telling her as best I could that God loved her. She couldn't get enough of the stories in the Bible, but she didn't seem to understand that she needed Jesus. She kept telling me that I loved her, and that her "sisters" loved her, and that was enough.

I didn't know enough Spanish to explain to her that our affection for her was peanuts compared to God's unending love. Each day I tried, and each day I became more discouraged. I wanted so badly for Claudia to accept Christ.

Then one day I was working on the roof of the orphanage, holding down the sheets of tin so they could be bolted together. The guy underneath the roof banged on the spot where he was going to drill through, and I placed my hands around the spot, calling that I was ready.

Either he misjudged or I did, because a few seconds later his drill was digging into the palm of my hand! At first I didn't realize what had happened, but as I picked up a nut and a washer to secure the bolt to the roof, I saw the blood dripping from my palm.

Much cold water, gauze, and a few tears later, I emerged from the bathroom to find Claudia sitting on a bench, waiting for me. Small brown arms went around my waist, and she began to cry, saying something over and over in Spanish and pointing to my hand.

Eventually I found a translator and got her message. She was trying to tell me that when she saw the hole in my hand, she saw what Jesus had done for her. I guess she must have remembered the story I told her about Jesus' death, and the sight of my wounded hand reminded her that he bled, too. In that instant, she recognized Jesus' great love for her. She crawled into my lap right there and kissed my injured hand as she prayed that Jesus would be her Savior.

Watching Claudia's thankfulness for human love and then her tears as she realized God's love, it dawned on me how often I had taken Jesus' love and death for granted. So as she prayed aloud, I prayed silently that God would forgive me for losing sight of the very truth I was trying to share.

I went to Venezuela expecting to tell some Bible stories and paint some walls. I hoped God would use my efforts, but I never dreamed I'd see such a dramatic reward. I came home with a new understanding of love—and a friend I'll catch up with in heaven someday.

 

[beensetfree]

Them!

It’s a word that I hear so often in counseling.

The other person, the spouse, the boss, the co-worker, the
parent, the relative, the company, the government, the system,
the President, even God.

It’s always them.

Here’s a quick newsflash: you won’t have much luck changing them,
but there is one person who I can absolutely guarantee that you
can change who will have a bigger impact on your life than even
the President or the government.

It doesn’t matter whether this person is a Republican, Democrat,
hypocrite, or even all three, you can change them.

It doesn’t matter what denomination they belong to or even if
they have been inside of a church this decade, you can change
them.

It doesn’t matter what race or nationality they are, you can
change them.

This person has more power and influence over your life than
anyone alive or dead, all you have to do is to change them.

When THEY start changing, amazingly you will notice that it will
affect people around you; and even if people around you don’t
change, it will sure seem like they've changed.

Where can you find this all powerful person in your life?

I can tell you exactly.

Go to the mirror and there THEY will stand.

You need to get to work on THEM right away.

 

[beensetfree]

Diary of an Anorexic

A poor self-image. A low self-esteem. A yearning for a better body. A loss of control. These are things that most anorexics have in common. I know, because all these things once described me.

The following excerpts from my journal cover all phases of the disorder: how I fell prey to it, my conflicted feelings during recovery, and the revelation of how even now—more than a decade later—my experience with anorexia has forever changed me.

My Struggle Begins (ages 12 and 13)
February 15
I'm so gross! I don't know how anyone stands to look at me. All the skinny girls in my classes get the boyfriends, the attention, and what do I get? I get called a pig. Jason is the worst. I know brothers exist to make their sisters' lives miserable, but I think the reason Jason's comments hurt so much is because I know they're true. I am a pig. I eat way too often and way too much junk food. Mom says 110 pounds is fine for being 5 feet 3 inches tall, but I don't like how flabby I feel. I think I'm going to try to lose a few pounds—just enough so Jason will stop teasing me.

April 15
I'm not doing too bad—six pounds and counting. Another six or eight and I might look OK. I'd love to lose these thunder thighs. Jason doesn't call me "oinker" anymore, but I think that's only because Mom and Dad told him to stop.

April 24
I've made a pact with myself to cut out all "munchies" (like potato chips) from now on. And I've decided to cut out all desserts, too. That should really make a difference! Guess what I found out? A McDonald's cheeseburger has over 500 calories! And the fat content is super high! I will never eat there again!

May 21
I want to learn the caloric content in everything. I wonder how many calories are in a postage stamp. Do vitamins have calories? I know a stick of gum has 10 calories, but if I were to chew gum instead of eating lunch, I'd come out way ahead.

May 26
I've lost 17 pounds since I started dieting. It's getting harder to do, though, because Mom and Dad are noticing that I poke at my food rather than eat it. Tonight they practically force-fed me. They lectured me on eating a full meal, then made me drink a whole glass of milk—that's 110 calories! I didn't want it! It makes me sick to think they made me do something I didn't want to do.

June 1
I've noticed lately that Mom's been putting extra globs of peanut butter on my celery. I think she's trying to trick me into eating more calories, but I'm the one who's tricking her! When I get to school, I throw my lunch away. Then, while my friends scarf down their fat-filled lunches, I spend 30 minutes walking the halls. So not only do I resist consuming calories, I actually burn some! Ha! Who's in charge now?

June 15
Tomorrow we leave for Michigan for the summer. I'm kind of glad to be getting out of town because the cabin has always been a relaxing place for me, but I worry that Mom and Dad will be studying my every move.

July 1
I haven't weighed myself since I left Indiana because there's no scale here, but I think I've lost weight. I hope so—I'd love to go home at the end of the summer all skinny, pretty and tan. All my friends would be blown away!

July 15
I'm having a hard time getting a tan because I'm always wrapped in a sweatshirt and blanket. I'm sick of being cold all of the time. It was 88 degrees today, but I couldn't warm up. I'm tired a lot, too, and I'm constantly napping, but at least when I'm asleep I'm not thinking about food.

August 5
Today Mom asked me if I knew what anorexia nervosa is. She and Dad think I have it. That's crazy. Yes, I eat less now, but so what? Why do they have to criticize me for it? I get good grades. I try to make them happy. Why can't they let me have this one thing? Why do they have to control what I eat?

August 15
Time to go home. I'm worried, though. Mom and Dad say they're taking me to see Dr. Kirby when we get home. Why do they have to do that? I'm fine! What are they trying to prove?

August 24
OK—I wouldn't admit this to Mom and Dad, but I'm scared. Today when I stood up in church to sing a hymn, I blacked out. It was freaky! My eyes were open, but all I could see was darkness. I fell back into the pew, and Mom asked what was wrong. When I told her, she spazzed. I've never seen her look so petrified. Jason asked what kind of funky lipstick I had on, but I wasn't wearing any. He said my lips were completely white.

A Slow Recovery (age 13)
August 25
I'm being admitted into an Indianapolis hospital tomorrow. I'll be missing some school, but Dr. Kirby says I have no choice. I weigh 73 pounds.

September 1
I don't like my attending physician, Dr. Richards. He seems like a head case. He says any one of my major organs could give out at any moment—heart, lungs, kidneys. I thought he was exaggerating, but when he threatened to hook me up to an IV if I didn't gain weight, I figured he meant business.

September 8
Pastor Henderson visited me today. He prayed with me and told me the congregation had me in their prayers. I asked him to come again next week, and he said he had already planned to. His visit left me with a feeling of peace. For the first time since I was admitted, I feel like maybe everything will work out.

September 30
It's lonely in the hospital. I've gone through roommates like people go through chewing gum. They come and go, but I'm stuck here. Dr. Richards says I'm not going anywhere until I've gained seven more pounds. I miss my family, but fortunately either Mom or Dad visits every day. I feel terrible for having put them through this ordeal. Each night I ask God to keep them safe, healthy and happy. I feel better knowing God is watching over them.

October 30
I just got released—just in time for Halloween, not that I'll be trick-or-treating. Wouldn't Dr. Richards love to see me scarf down Halloween candy? Well, that won't be happening anytime soon. Right now, it's all I can do to down a couple pieces of pizza.

I weigh 90 pounds, and, I admit, I feel stronger and more energetic than I have in months. I'm not lightheaded now that I eat six small meals a day. And I no longer have to dress in three layers of clothing to stay warm. I guess my body fat is good for something.

November 7
I ate my first cookie in over six months today. It took me 45 minutes. Mom's proud of me, and I'm proud of myself. Eating that cookie was hard to do, but I did it. That's an accomplishment.

November 19
Ninety-two pounds—that sounds pretty scary. The scariest will be when I top the big 1-0-0. I'm not gaining as fast now that I'm at home, but that's OK. As long as I gain steadily, Dr. Richards says I don't have to go back to the hospital. Throughout this nightmare, Mom and Dad have been so supportive. I used to feel like everyone was against me, but now I can see that Mom and Dad are on my side. I know they always were, but when I was starving myself, I couldn't see things clearly.

Oh—guess what? Jason bought me roses as an I'm-proud-of-you type thing. It's definitely abnormal for a 16-year-old to spend $50 on his sister! But that meant so much to me. Smelling those flowers makes me feel genuinely happy—something I haven't felt in a really long time.

November 26
Jill stopped by today, and she said I looked "awesome." That made me feel good—to know that I could actually gain 20 pounds and still be told I look good. Now I see that being attractive isn't so much about being a low weight—it's about being a healthy weight. And that's what I really want—to be healthy (and happy!).

Recovery (age 23)
December 6
Today I stumbled across a horrifying picture taken during the summer of '86, and a flood of bad memories came rushing back. Mom and Dad feel the same way. Mom still gets teary when my anorexic days are mentioned, and Dad recalls the summer and fall of 1986 as the "darkest days" of his life. Just last year, Dad shared something with me that made my heart sink.

He said the week before I was admitted into the hospital, he found me on the couch in the living room. As he looked at my frail, skeletal body, a chill shot up his spine. He told me I was lying so still and silent, he put his cheek next to my mouth to feel if I was still breathing. He said I looked dead. I'll never forget that.

Live after Anorexia
Although I still have some hang-ups about food and often still wish my thighs were slimmer, I have learned to cope with negative self-talk through prayer. And though I've always wanted so badly to please everyone, I've come to realize that, ultimately, it doesn't matter what others think of me. God loves me no matter how I look. He loves me because he made me, and because he is love.

And he shows me his love every day in many ways.
When I gaze into my husband's eyes, glance at my college degree hanging on the wall, or hold my baby niece in my arms, I am reminded of all the things I would have missed if I'd allowed anorexia to take my life 13 years ago. I feel blessed to have gotten a second chance at life. Thanks to God's love and my family's undying support, I'm living proof that life after anorexia can be good.

 

[beensetfree]

Family

Are you aware that if we died tomorrow, the company that we are
working for could easily replace us in a matter of days?

But the family we left behind will feel the loss
for the rest of their lives.

And come to think of it, we pour ourselves more into work than
into our own family, an unwise investment indeed,
don't you think?

 

[beensetfree]

My Dad, My Hero

"Dad always told me not to waste the trash bags," says Michael.

If the bag was full of paper, it could be used again, Nathel Tait would tell his son. If it was full of garbage, it should be thrown away, because it would start to smell.

Ah, words of wisdom from Dad.

Michael says his dad was a wealth of wise words—not only about trash bags, but about life and love and things of eternal value. Words that will forever cling to Michael's soul. Words he'd give anything to hear from his father once again.

Michael's dad died of cancer a little more than a year ago, and for Michael, the pain is still fresh.

"It was the hardest thing I've ever been through," says Michael, a member of supergroup dc Talk. "Nothing hits you like the loss of a parent. It rocks your planet, the very ground you stand on."

Ask Michael to describe his dad, and he's quick to say, "My hero."

"My dad was such a poet," says Michael. "He always had something worthwhile to say. I took in everything he ever said, because I had so much respect for him.

"I always tell my friends, 'My dad said this' and 'My dad said that.' It drives everybody crazy. But that's just the way I feel about my dad."

Of course, Michael's dad, who was a pastor, taught him about more than just trash bags.

"Let me tell you the two most important things I learned from my dad," says Michael. "Number one, love people. That's what he did. He cried with people, he laughed with people. Everybody was his friend. He could care less about your race, your nationality, your socio-economic status, whatever. All he cared about was you, your soul.

"Number two, live for God and don't get caught up in the things of this world, because they're just fleeting. The world will get the best of you if you let it, so we need to truly live for God.

"My dad preached those two things his whole life. And those two things have shaped who I am today. I love people, and I realize that life is short and God is real, and that I need to live for him."

Michael was visiting his parents in Washington, D.C., during the Christmas holidays in '97 when, two days after Christmas, his dad complained of stomach pains. Michael took him to the hospital, where doctors found the cancer.

A few weeks later, after Michael had returned to his Tennessee home, Mr. Tait started going downhill pretty quickly. Michael called home every day to get updates on his dad's condition.

When Mr. Tait slipped into a coma in February '98, Michael flew back to D.C. to be with his father.

"I spent the last night with him while he was still alive," Michael says. "The nurse had said that even though Dad was unconscious, he still might be able to hear me. I talked to him all night long, told him how much I loved him. The whole family got to talk to him. We said, 'Dad, it's OK. You can go. We'll take care of Mom. Things will be fine.'

"The next morning, I had to fly back to Nashville. I called that night, and I was talking to my mom on the phone when he died. She's sitting there with my dad, and he dies while I'm on the line. My mom started weeping over the phone, thanking him for 53 years of marriage as he was slipping away, then she just started wailing. Man, it was brutal."

It's a memory Michael will never shake. Nor would he want to. The pain might someday fade away, but not the memories.

"I might be in the mall, and I'll see a father and a son, and it hits me," says Michael. "Or I might be out for a drive in the country, and I'll smell the dew off the roses, or the aroma of the honeysuckle right around dusk, and I'll think about him. And a tear will come into my eye.

"The man was my hero."

 

[beensetfree]

Kevin's Different World

My brother Kevin thinks God lives under his bed. At least that's what I heard him say one night. He was praying out loud in his dark bedroom, and I stopped outside his closed door to listen.

"Are you there, God?" he said. "Where are you? Oh, I see. Under the bed."

I giggled softly and tiptoed off to my own room. Kevin's unique perspectives are often a source of amusement. But that night something else lingered long after the humor. I realized for the first time the very different world Kevin lives in.

He was born 30 years ago, mentally disabled as a result of difficulties during labor. Apart from his size (he's 6-foot-2), there are few ways in which he is an adult. He reasons and communicates with the capabilities of a 7-year-old, and he always will.

He will probably always believe that God lives under his bed, that Santa Claus is the one who fills the space under our tree every Christmas, and that airplanes stay up in the sky because angels carry them.

I remember wondering if Kevin realizes he is different. Is he ever dissatisfied with his monotonous life? Up before dawn each day, off to work at a workshop for the disabled, home to walk our cocker spaniel, returning to eat his favorite macaroni-and-cheese for dinner, and later to bed. The only variation in the entire scheme are laundry days, when he hovers excitedly over the washing machine like a mother with her newborn child.

He does not seem dissatisfied. He lopes out to the bus every morning at 7:05, eager for a day of simple work. He wrings his hands excitedly while the water boils on the stove before dinner, and he stays up late twice a week to gather our dirty laundry for his next day's laundry chores.

And Saturdays—oh, the bliss of Saturdays! That's the day my dad takes Kevin to the airport to have a soft drink, watch the planes land, and speculate loudly on the destination of each passenger inside.

"That one's goin' to Chi-car-go!" Kevin shouts as he claps his hands. His anticipation is so great he can hardly sleep on Friday nights.

I don't think Kevin knows anything exists outside his world of daily rituals and weekend field trips. He doesn't know what it means to be discontent. His life is simple. He will never know the entanglements of wealth or power, and he does not care what brand of clothing he wears or what kind of food he eats. He recognizes no differences in people, treating each person as an equal and a friend. His needs have always been met, and he never worries that one day they may not be.

His hands are diligent. Kevin is never so happy as when he is working. When he unloads the dishwasher or vacuums the carpet, his heart is completely in it. He does not shrink from a job when it is begun, and he does not leave a job until it is finished. But when his tasks are done, Kevin knows how to relax. He is not obsessed with his work or the work of others.

His heart is pure. He still believes everyone tells the truth, promises must be kept, and when you are wrong, you apologize instead of argue. Free from pride and unconcerned with appearances, Kevin is not afraid to cry when he is hurt, angry or sorry. He is always transparent, always sincere.

And he trusts God. Not confined by intellectual reasoning, when he comes to Christ, he comes as a child.

Kevin seems to know God—to really be friends with him—in a way that is difficult for an "educated" person to grasp. God seems like his closest companion.

In my moments of doubt and frustrations with my Christianity, I envy the security Kevin has in his simple faith. It is then that I am most willing to admit that he has some divine knowledge that rises above my mortal questions. It is then I realize that perhaps he is not the one with the handicap—I am.

My obligations, my fear, my pride, my circumstances—they all become disabilities when I do not submit them to Christ. Who knows if Kevin comprehends things I can never learn? After all, he has spent his whole life in that kind of innocence, praying after dark and soaking up the goodness and love of the Lord.

And one day, when the mysteries of heaven are opened, and we are all amazed at how close God really is to our hearts, I'll realize that God heard the simple prayers of a boy who believed that God lived under his bed.

Kevin won't be surprised at all.

 

[beensetfree]

Let Those Cares Go!

Though I closed my eyes and tried to rest, my mind refused to turn off. I couldn't stop wondering if I should have said or done something different.

Finally, I got up and went over to my computer, hoping to find some nugget of truth to ease my mind. Tears came to my eyes as I caught sight of a scripture someone had posted: "Cast thy burden upon the LORD, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved" (Psalm 55:22).

All week long, the Lord had been speaking to me about casting my burdens or cares upon Him--now here was that theme again! Suddenly, I knew I needed to hand over to Him all my worry about the situation and what would happen. If I'd messed up, He was big enough to handle it! I didn't need to carry the burden.

Cares come in all sorts of different sizes and shapes. We can be careful about all the things we need to do, careful about what we've said or done, careful about other people, careful about our health--we seem to attract cares like a magnet! At the time, the cares on our shoulder seem heavier than anything else in the entire world could possibly be.

But whatever our care might be, we weren't meant to carry it! We were meant to cast it. It's actually prideful of us to insist on worrying and carrying our cares when God tells us to cast them. God cares perfectly for each one of us.

He is our infallible heavenly Shepherd. He urges us to humble ourselves--admit our inability--and cast every worry, burden, and care upon Him.

"Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you." 1 Peter 5:6,7 (KJV)

 

[beensetfree]

The Folly of Carrying Cares

Bridget had a problem--a problem that kept getting bigger and bigger. All day long, she kept getting packages called CARES handed to her. The CARES came in all sorts of shapes and sizes and from all different sources. And, rather than handing each new package to her father, who kept offering to carry them for her, Bridget insisted on carrying them herself. After all, it was part of being responsible, wasn't it?

An onlooker looking at Bridget might have been uncertain whether to laugh or cry. Bridget was running about the house with a huge mound of packages in her arms. She couldn't see where she was going. She couldn't see the needs other people had. She couldn't see the lovely gifts her father had laid out for her. The pile of CARES in her arms blocked her vision!

Bridget burst into tears. She couldn't stand it anymore! Her arms ached so dreadfully from carrying the weight of all her CARES. She had endured as long as she could, thinking all the while it would get better--the CARES would eventually go away. But for every CARE she disposed of, another came! She was certain no one else in the entire universe had been tried quite like she was being tried.

Bridget felt a gentle hand on her shoulder. It was her father. "My dear daughter, you can't carry these CARES."

Bridget choked back a sob. "I know I can't! But what am I to do? They all need carried and dealt with. And I do so want to serve you, Father, and do a good job..."

To Bridget's surprise, her father started picking up the packages in his own strong arms. "Let me carry the CARES. You weren't designed to carry them. They're only blocking your vision."

"Blocking my vision?" Bridget queried.

Her father nodded. "You didn't see the flower bouquet I'd left for you in the hallway did you? Or the tears in Jill's eyes this morning that betrayed her need for a hug? Or the spectacular sunrise?"

Bridget shook her head. She hadn't seen any of those things because of the CARES in her arms. She remembered passing Jill that morning, but rather than giving her a hug, she'd snapped at her and mumbled something about how she could use a little more help.

She'd been asking her father to help her bless others, but she'd been blinded to the opportunities before her because of these CARES! What a relief it would be to place them all in her father's hands. She watched him pick them up with mounting joy...until he touched one of the largest CARES.

"Be careful with that one!" she cautioned. "I wouldn't hold it on its side like that. It's very important."

"Bridget, if I'm going to carry your CARES, you have to trust me. I love you better than life itself. I will handle your CARES better than you ever could--but you have to trust that, even if things don't turn out as you imagined, I know what I'm doing."

Bridget blushed. How silly to doubt her father! She knew he was completely wise and caring and loved her perfectly. "I'll trust you," she whispered.

Bridget stood up again with a light feeling she hadn't felt for months. She was free! She could see and move at liberty again without the weight of all those CARES bogging her down. She set off toward the kitchen with a song in her heart...

Out of the corner of her eye, Bridget caught sight of one of the CARES her father was carrying. "Oh, I'd better carry that one," she exclaimed, grabbing the CARE as she spoke. "I have to take care of it this afternoon, and if I don't carry it, I might forget."

Bridget's father shook his head. "My darling daughter, can't you trust me to remind you? Here, write yourself a note if you will, but don't carry the CARE. If you carry it, you'll only end up bogged down again."

Bridget knew her father was right. She handed back the CARE to her father and again felt the joy of being at liberty.

Yet the strangest thing kept happening. All day long, she continued to collect CARES. At first, Bridget waited until she was overwhelmed and couldn't see at all before she remembered to hand the CARES over to her father.

Gradually, however, she began to realize she didn't have to wait. She could trust her father, admit that she couldn't carry any of it herself, hand her father each CARE as it arrived, and live in freedom!

"Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that he may exalt you in due time: Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you." 1 Peter 5:6,7 (KJV)

 

[beensetfree]

Dealing with the Cares


Cares, concerns, or WORRIES! We all have them. They range from choosing the right curriculum to genuine concerns about our personal ability to teach our children. They might include socialization fears, future job and family opportunities for our children, or simply the persistent thought that others think we are weird. You name it, and I'm sure someone has carried it as a care.


God did not intend for it to be this way. As I was lying awake at the hospital unable to move after a recent surgery, I experienced a lot of cares! Was my tumor cancer? Would I have the opportunity to share the Lord with those I'd been neglecting? Would my children soon forget me? As you can see, my mind was going in a very care-filled direction.

I was almost overwhelmed. But a strange thing began to happen as I began to identify these cares one by one. I was able to give them to the Lord and trust Him. Before I knew it, I was in a place where my only concern was that I please God with my life. This was truly freeing.

So this month, as you give God your cares, make it your prayer to please Him with your life. As other cares try to creep in, cast them out! Can you imagine the difference it will make to your homeschooling day if you weren't carrying any concerns? I'm praying you'll give it a try.

PS: The tumor was cancer-free, and God is miraculously healing the large incision from the inside out!

 

[beensetfree]

The least of these

There's no way you can properly prepare for Calcutta. Even the billboard on the highway going into the city makes you wonder what you've gotten yourself into. It says, "Welcome to Calcutta—a City of Filth, Hunger, Warmth, Smiles and Joy!"

I thought I was ready when I left for India. I was a college student traveling with a group of volunteers as part of a $12 million airlift organized by Heart to Heart International, a Christian ministry founded by my dad.

But when we got to Calcutta, I was immediately overwhelmed. I felt a sense of hopelessness as I looked at the skin-and-bones children, the human waste in the streets, the flies, the women sitting in front of mounds of animal waste, making patties with their bare hands and baking them over open fires to sell as fuel. And the sights were nothing compared to the smell of the city—a mixture of death, feces and rotten food.

During our time in Calcutta, we talked with people on the streets and visited orphanages and hospitals. But my most meaningful experience happened at a place called the Home for Dying Destitutes—a place for dying people who have nowhere else to go.

One of the workers in the Home suggested that I help feed the lady in cot 17—a lady who was too weak to feed herself. She weighed about 70 pounds, had three teeth and paper-thin skin. The diaper she wore needed changing and she babbled constantly in a language I couldn't understand. I would like to tell you that my first thought was, Of course I'll help her—she's one of God's children just like I am.

But it wasn't. My first response was that this work was too far below me, too gross. But there was a sign on the wall that said, "Do small things with great love." It seemed to say to me, "It's not what you do, or how much you do; what matters is the love you put in the doing."

So I went to the woman in cot 17 and fed her small bites of rice, curry and fish. She ate a little, but what she wanted most was for me to sit so close to her that we were touching, as if she craved the touch of another human being more than she craved even food.

The longer I looked at her, the more I realized this wasn't just a meal that was happening. Finally, as I held a cup of water to her lips, she pointed at her heart, then pointed at me.

In that very moment I experienced a whole new kind of love, the kind I think God must feel for us. I knew I would do anything for this woman. I said, "I love you" to her and as soon as I did, tears came pouring out of my eyes. When the words left my mouth, I felt that I experienced God's love for me, too. I have done nothing to deserve his love, and yet it overwhelms me. As he showed in the life of Jesus, God has said "I will do anything for you."

I left the Home thinking, God chooses to come at the weirdest moments. Later I realized that it wasn't such a weird moment. It was the Thursday before Easter—the night Jesus washed his disciples' feet.

A few weeks later, when I got back to my comfortable room in my comfortable house in Kansas, I realized my experience in Calcutta wasn't one of those emotional highs that goes away after a few weeks. The lady in cot 17—I never did get her name—is like an anchor in my mind. Experiencing God's love through her has changed the way I work as a resident assistant in my college dormitory.

Sometimes, as I am dealing with a situation in the dorm and I really want to be doing something else, I realize that in those moments, the girls in my dorm are the "least of these" Jesus talks about in Matthew 25:40. I need to treat them the way I would treat Jesus if he were right in front of me.

My experience in Calcutta sits at the front of my brain and affects virtually every decision I make.

Going to Calcutta showed me that my whole life boils down to Jesus' words, "Love one another." We are on this earth to show God's love. And we don't have to go to Calcutta to do it. As the sign in the Home for the Dying Destitutes showed me, it's not how much you do, it's how much love you put into what you do.

 

[beensetfree]

Welcome to Boot Camp!

The summer before my senior year in high school, I had the chance to spend two months in Malawi, Africa, as a missionary with Teen Missions. It was an awesome experience that I'll never forget. But getting ready for the experience meant a lot of preparation and training. And that's what I got at Teen Mission's Boot Camp in Merritt Island, Florida.

Each morning, the rest of my team and I had to get up at 5:30, be ready in 10 minutes, then head to the obstacle course. It was a fun, but challenging, way to start the day. For the rest of the day, we went to classes that taught us how to put up a building from start to finish, because that's the work we'd be doing on the mission field.

It was hot and humid. We were sweaty and sticky and dirty all the time. There were no showers, so the only way to get cleaned off was to take a bath with a sponge and a bucket of water. But even after a bucket bath, it only took five minutes to get sweaty again.

My tent was back in the palm woods, sitting in what seemed like a foot of water. It was a regular swamp! My stuff was wet all the time and the mosquitoes were terrible. At first, I hated boot camp, but eventually, I got used to it.

Boot camp was a lot harder than I thought it would be, and the only way I got through it was with the help of the Lord. When my group finally got to Malawi, all the hard work paid off in one of the best experiences of my life. We helped build an orphanage and shared the gospel with hundreds of people. And yes, we still had to take those bucket baths!

 

[beensetfree]

You Don't Need a Passport

John Gleich lifted a young boy up on his shoulders and dashed around the crowded park. The child squealed excitedly and chattered something in Spanish. Both had wide grins on their faces as they chased other children.

It was all part of John's cross-cultural summer missions trip, where he helped with a vacation Bible school ministering to Spanish-speaking people.

The setting? Mexico? Spain? Somewhere in South America?

Nope. Inner-city Chicago, just 40 miles from John's suburban home. John was one of 19 high school students who'd taken the short trip to carry God's love to another world—even though that world was less than an hour away.

John and his friends from youth group not only held a daily Bible school. They also served Chicago's New Life Community Church by painting walls, doing yard work, cleaning windows, sweeping floors, babysitting the youth pastor's children, and pretty much anything else they were asked to do.

They also took part in evangelistic outreaches.

"One afternoon we went out street-witnessing," says group member Sarah Chase. "At first it was so discouraging. People even yelled at us. Then I talked with this 11-year-old boy and he was real open. … We ended up kneeling together right on the sidewalk, and he prayed to receive Christ. It was incredible."

Even though it was a life-stretching adventure, was it really a missions experience? After all, they were so close to home.

You bet.

"You don't have to go to another country to experience poverty or find needy people," says John. "We'd walk down the street on the south side of Chicago and see homeless people carrying everything they owned. It was kind of shocking. These people were only 40 miles down the road from where I live!"

"The youth pastor from New Life told us that missions is all about people," says Byron Powell. "Wherever there are people who need to hear God's Word, you've got a 'mission.' It could be your own hometown. It could be the house next door. It could be your own school. Wherever you find people who need Christ, you find a place to be a missionary."

 

[beensetfree]

What the Mirror Doesn't See

As youth group games go, the rules for this one were pretty simple. At the far end of the room were two trays full of ice and marbles. The object of the game was to run to the tray, pick up a marble with your toes, and hop back. The team that could fish out all its marbles first would win. No problem, right?

Well, it was a problem for Joel Sonnenberg. With a twinkle in his eye, Joel asked his youth pastor, "What if you don't have any toes?"

Joel lost his toes, as well as one hand and the fingers on the other, when more than 85 percent of his body was burned in a car accident 19 years ago.

It's a miracle he didn't lose his life.


Out of the Ashes
On September 15, 1979, 22-month-old Joel was riding in a car with his father and his uncle. In another car were Joel's mother, aunt, and 3-year-old sister. The family was headed for a nice, relaxing vacation in Maine. But then, while they were stopped at a New Hampshire toll booth, a 36-ton tractor trailer slammed into the row of cars that included the ones carrying Joel and his family.

The women climbed out of their car unhurt. But the green Chevy carrying Joel went up in flames. Joel's dad and uncle rushed out with their clothing and hair on fire. Each thought the other one had grabbed Joel. Neither had.

A 20-year-old passerby heard Joel's cries, reached into the car, and pulled him out in his car seat. When Joel's mom found her son on the ground behind her, he looked like a mass of ash. His arms were charred and quivering, his hair was gone, and his face was black; he was literally smoldering.

Emergency personnel arrived in minutes, poured water on Joel to cool his skin, and rushed him by ambulance to a nearby hospital. From there he was taken to a larger hospital in Boston. There, he was given a 10 percent shot at survival.

A few days later Joel was transferred to the Shriners Burn Institute across town, where he received advanced treatment, namely painful skin grafts. He stayed remarkably strong throughout the whole ordeal. Four and a half months later, after countless surgeries, he returned with his parents to the family's home in Nyack, New York.

But that was only the first step on Joel's long, long road to living a somewhat normal life. He suffered through more surgeries and excruciating treatments for years. He lived with constant physical and emotional pain.

When he was a little boy, Joel quickly began to experience how cruel the world can be to people who are "different." Stares and comments followed him everywhere. People left restaurants because his face upset them.

Even now, 19 years later, Joel still gets some of the same responses from uncomfortable strangers. And he's not always sure how to react.

"Sometimes I feel angry," he admits. "Sometimes I just ignore them. Sometimes I want to have a little fun with them—follow them around or crazy stuff like that. Sometimes it's suffocating. Sometimes I just want to get away.

"I'd like to say that I just smile every time, but that's not the case. I don't want to pretend that it is. I'm still learning to smile at people's curiosity."

Amazing Accomplishments
Despite the insensitive reactions of some people, Joel has found acceptance among many others, especially since his family moved to the small town of Montreat, North Carolina. During his high school years, Joel found plenty of ways to cope with his limitations and develop his strengths.

And Joel has accomplished a lot—a whole lot. He captained his high school soccer team, was voted prince at the junior prom, carried the 1996 Summer Olympics torch through his community, and was named the Western North Carolina Citizen of the Year in 1996. He received a $17,500 college scholarship from Discover Card for his high school performance, extracurricular activities, and inspiring attitude toward life. He's an Eagle Scout. He's traveled to Bolivia and Savannah, Georgia, on mission trips with Montreat Presbyterian Church.

Now 21 years old, Joel's a junior at Taylor University in Upland, Indiana. He's active in student government and intramural soccer, volleyball and flag football. And he's appeared on numerous television programs, in newspapers and magazines.

The awards and praise are nice, but they don't allow people to see inside him. And that's the part he wants to share with those he meets. Rather than standing on his achievements or the hardships he's overcome, he wants to be known for who he is.

God's Magnifying Glass
So who is Joel Sonnenberg? How has he been able to deal with the inexpressible pain, both physical and emotional, the torture of more than 45 surgeries, the constant stares from strangers, and the cruel comments like "Take off your mask"?

"I've never enjoyed the way I look, and I don't like to look at myself in the mirror all that much," Joel says.

Yet, despite the pain, Joel is at peace with himself, with the person who lives inside a scarred body. He sees himself as a magnifying glass highlighting the power of God's love. "That's my purpose, to show God is good. God is so great in my life and he loves [others] just as much as he loves me," Joel says.

It seems hard to believe those words come from someone who's suffered so much. Yet, when asked, Joel says he can see God's hand in his life.

"Everything happens for a reason," Joel says. "The greatest times in my life are when I reflect and see what God has done—all the provisions he's had for me. I say, 'Wow, there's gotta be a higher hand in this.' … I'm confident Jesus is the only answer."

With the good times have come many low times, Joel admits. At the age of 15, during one of his lowest lows, he told his mother in exasperation, "Mom, I feel like I've suffered more than Jesus did on the cross." Even now, he says, sometimes, when lying in bed, all the mean comments he's heard will flood into his mind and "disable" him.

He deals with the pain the only way he knows how. Rather than feel sorry for himself, he reaches out to God. "When you [go through] insurmountable, indescribable physical and emotional pain, you rely on something greater. I'm not one tough cookie all the time. I rely on God, I pray a lot, read the Bible, talk to others."

His self-image, he says, is built on knowing Christ and being able to share that with others. He often speaks to Christian audiences and other groups about the amazing love of God in his life.

Joel is always happy to hear how his testimony has inspired people, but he wants everyone to know he's only human.

"I certainly have my weaknesses," Joel says. "I'm not a storybook character. I'm a real person. I have emotions. I sin just like everybody else."

Even though Joel has struggles most people can't imagine, he also faces challenges every college student can understand. He strives to keep his thought life under control. He's tempted to veg out when he should be getting something done. And he wonders what's in store for the future.

Looking Ahead
After college, Joel plans to continue speaking and writing about his life. "People say I'm going into the ministry. I say, 'What am I doing now?' … No matter where I'm going to be—in business or flipping burgers at McDonald's—I'm always going to have a ministry."

Joel also hopes to get married. He's dated a few girls, but he's still looking for the right one—someone, he says, who will appreciate who he is, scars and all, who will care for him as deeply as his family does, and who will be willing to show that love in public.

"The Lord's given me the opportunity to be at Taylor with a whole bunch of nice women, and I'm going to take advantage of that opportunity," he says with a smile. "I'm not going to sit back and wait for them to call me."

When he asks a girl out, he gets different reactions. "Some girls don't want to have anything to do with me," he says. "Some girls think the world of me."

No matter what the future holds for Joel here on earth, he knows his hopes will ultimately be met only in heaven. There, he'll have hands and a new body, and he'll be in God's presence forever.

"Death's gonna be a cinch compared to all I've gone through," he says. "Heaven means freedom from everything—the world, the bonds of all our scars. I look forward to it."


The Power of Forgiveness
Joel and his family had a unique opportunity last July to show God's love and forgiveness in a New Hampshire court at the sentencing of Reginald Dort, the truck driver who caused the accident that forever changed the Sonnenbergs' lives.

After the 1979 accident, Dort jumped bail and fled to his native Nova Scotia, Canada, where he continued driving his semi. He successfully avoided the law until the summer of 1997. Then, while Dort was stopped at a weigh station in Moline, Illinois, the attendant noticed his truck was 1,300 pounds overweight. She reported him to the state police radio room and was told to call for a state trooper.

Dort was sent to jail in New Hampshire, where he spent about a year. At his sentencing July 17, 1998, the Sonnenbergs faced Dort for the first time. He pleaded guilty to one count of second-degree assault.

The Sonnenberg family—father Mike, mother Janet, Joel, his sisters Jami, 23, and Sommer, 17, and his brother Kyle, 8—filled the front row of the courtroom. All but Kyle spoke to the court. After recounting the pain and suffering caused by the accident, each family member spoke of Jesus Christ's power to transform lives and offer forgiveness.

The last person to address the truck driver was Joel.

"This is my prayer for you, [Mr. Dort] … that you may know that our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ's grace has no limits and the world does not make sense without him."

As Joel spoke, his family gulped back their sobs. Even those people in the courtroom who had never met Joel fought tears.

Dort, 51, received a sentence of two to seven years in New Hampshire state prison for assault, with the maximum sentence suspended. Dort didn't address the court. But, at the request of Judge Douglas Gray, the truck driver turned to the Sonnenbergs and said, "I'm sorry."

"I think [the sentencing] was a tough time for all of us, but it was something we had to do," Joel says