A Bumper Sticker

A lot of years ago, when I first moved to Texas, I pretty much came empty handed. I'd rented an efficiency apartment in Dallas, sight unseen, while I was in Indianapolis from a leasing firm. As I've written about before, I came to Texas in a small Subaru with two cats, a large dog, a few clothes, a lamp, a pillow and an outdoor chaise lounge chair to sleep on. My car was packed with this. When I showed up at my apartment in Texas, I had $13.00 in my pocket...which promptly went for bug spray.
I came to Texas because God told me to. Hey, I tried to argue, reason, I even backed out once, but this Guy just doesn't give in. So, there I was flat smack in the of middle of Dallas knowing no one, with whatever change I had after buying bug spray. The first job I applied for was a couple of streets behind me at a popular restaurant/bar and I was hired. They trained me for bartending for about an hour and set me off on my own. I had about 6 years bartending experience. From the first day there, I was making great tips, so I never really had to worry about money. Which had been my main concern, though I'd been lead to 'fear not', I was still a 'baby' Christian. Anyone familiar with that term?
Just a bit of history for those who don't know me. I was raised with never having attended a church. I was agnostic on my most spiritual days, atheist the rest. I came to God on my own without being in a church and I'd never studied the Bible. So, after becoming a Christian, finding a church (though I never met anyone in it...always the shy bystander) and studying the Bible on my own (usually with a beer in hand)...I was lead to Dallas. How I was lead, let's make that another story.
So there I was in Dallas, working as many hours as I could, meeting a lot of people, partying nearly every hour I wasn't working. I remember feeling so torn on the inside. The working and party girl...that's who'd I'd been all my life. However, it wasn't who I was becoming before I moved to Dallas, and I could feel with certainty that it wasn't who I was called to Dallas to be.
I decided I needed to find a church. I didn't see many churches, and the church I'd been going to in Indianapolis was a spirit filled church. (If you don't know what that is, again...another story, another time) I looked in the yellow pages, I looked in the paper...how do you choose? The thing here is, I am a shy person. So, this was hard for me. I prayed and asked God to lead me to the church He wanted me to be in.
One day, driving to work, I was behind a car that had a bumper sticker with the call numbers of a radio station. It didn't say what kind of station it was, but I felt that feeling that was becoming familiar to me. I wrote the numbers down, found it on my radio and of course, it was a Christian radio station. Was there any doubt? I listened to it for a few days, it played the contemporary Christian rock music that I liked. I called the radio station and told them I was new to Dallas and asked if they could give me the name of any spirit filled churches in my area. The one they referred me to was in Farmers Branch, about 20 miles away, called Word of Faith.
I started taking Sunday lunches off at work and attending the church.
After a few months, I'd not met any people at church, hadn't made any friends there (so shy), but they announced the new semester of their bible college was beginning soon. That familiar feeling thumped around in my stomach. I didn't want to go to bible college. I'd have to take days off from work, it was an extra 40 miles of driving five days a week. I didn't want to. But God is pushy with me. So, I enrolled and began bible college. I have to admit it, I loved it. I met some people, loved the instructors and all my classes.
At work, many of my daytime regulars would ask me why I wasn't there. I caught a lot of flack from them about going to bible college and bartending. I didn't understand the problem. I began to do a word study on alcohol and drinking. Took me about three days with my nose in a concordance translating, but I decided it wasn't a good witness for me to be bartending at that time. Immediately, I felt a peace come over me and I knew that it was the right decision.
The next morning I went in to work and turned in my two week notice. This was sad, because I'd made some friends there, dated a lot of the waiters and other staff... That night I went to a Wednesday night service with some of my buddies from school. This is the night that I've written about before. While I was sitting with my friends, I turned around in my seat and asked the stranger sitting behind me if he'd like to join us for coffee after the service. My friends were surprised, yeah...me too. That stranger was Mark. Mark and I were married two weeks later. It turns out that he was also going to the bible college and had seen me on the first day. He told me later that the first day he saw me he knew he wanted to marry me.

There are so many paths that cross our way each and every day. We decide which one to take, sometimes we have no idea that one path might be more important than the other. I fought tooth and nail not to come to Texas, just the way I fought tooth and nail against God for 26 years. I've learned that my way isn't the only way. One hard lesson for someone as stubborn as I am. I've learned the louder my voice is, the less I can hear Gods voice. The stronger my will is the harder it is for me to bend to Gods will. I've learned to be quiet and to listen...and to trust what I know is true. Mark and I have been married now for 21 years. We have two great teenage boys. We have had our hard times and we've been blessed.
I'm grateful every day for following what I knew to be true, that feeling I've learned to pay attention to and to follow through with. Just as I'm glad about the path that one person in Dallas took over 20 years ago to put that Christian radio stations bumper sticker on the back of their car. Would I had found the Word of Faith Church, the bible college and Mark without it? I don't know. Do you?