Redemption Story

I feel like I need to share a story with others and this seems like the most effective way to do that. So, I don’t usually share things of this nature here, but as I was praying this morning I felt like God said this was a story that needed to be told, so here goes:

Our God is a God of restoration, who takes the bruised and shattered pieces of life and puts them together in a way that is not just whole but is wholly more beautiful than anything we could have created on our own. That’s what this story is about; it is a redemption story.
The summer after my sophomore year of high school I was headed to church camp in Colorado where I would get to know a guy named Jeff Priour. I didn’t think a whole lot about him at first other than that he was nice, cute, and everyone seemed to like him. Well, on the 20something hour ride back to Texas we sat next to each other and a few months after that started dating. This was also at the same time that my parents had separated and then later divorced. Jeff was there through all of that – it was by far the hardest, worst, darkest time in my life. That made things really hard on us. I did some pretty unspeakable damage to Jeff. I took EVERYthing out on him… I wish that were an understatement. I wish that I could make him forget some (or a lot) of the things that I did and said to him when we were dating, but maybe it is good so that he can remember what God has done. Jeff has this ability though to remember details from forever ago really well. Years after we broke up he would say “Hey, remember that time you got mad and told me ‘blankety blank blank!’” While I have some vague memories of stuff I said and did that was awful, overall I really don’t remember most of it, it just seems like such a long time ago. So, anyway, we dated for 2 years of high school (1 year of college for him) and then I decide to go to Baylor. He moves up to Waco with me, literally, packs my stuff with me and moves me into my dorm room, takes me to a concert, I kiss him goodnight and then break up with him and we don’t talk for about the next 7 months. Granted I told him I didn’t want to date him in college when we started dating, but that didn’t make it much easier for him.
So, Act 2. We’re in Waco now and not really communicating at all. We are pretty incapable of communicating or interacting with each other in a way that is healthy or edifying. We continue to hurt each other either through actions or non-actions and take different paths. I choose the path of Jesus and moving forward, and Jeff chooses the path of alcohol and escape (not that I chose the high road at all, I still made a lot of mistakes with him). Towards the end of my freshman year I start dating again and don’t handle that well at all with Jeff and he sees the guy I am dating walking across the street towards my dorm one day as he’s driving by and he floors it like he’s going to run this guy over… he would never do that, but at the time he was really angry. So, there was some pretty heated animosity between us.
Time goes on, we make nice and are friends and I start seriously dating someone else for a long time. This guy went to talk to Jeff about dating me before we started officially dating and Jeff told him ‘If you hurt her, I will kill you.’ And Jason thought he meant it. (I didn’t know about all of that until after Jason and I had broken up). Jeff and I stayed friends through my other relationships and his as well. We still managed to hurt each other and default to our unhealthy ways of relating to each other, mostly because we knew each other so well that we knew right where it hurt and would go there frequently.
Until a few days ago I had been single for 2 years and 7 months. And man, did I need that time. I have experienced so much healing and wholeness and so has Jeff as he dealt with his issues and turned back to Jesus. My family had always told me that there was a 40% chance that I would marry Jeff and others in college had suggested it, but I always said that ‘I would never date him again and it would take an act of God for us to ever love each other again.’ About December of this past year was when I realized that some real feelings for Jeff had developed as I watched him grow and be transformed by the love of God. So, we talked about it and while we both liked each other we were determined to honor God in whatever he was calling us to do and not move forward until we knew that calling. We have since walked that road, stumbling sometimes, with uncertainty and confidence, fear and excitement. But all the while, we are amazed at how God has healed us individually and therefore restored our relationship. Whatever the end is (and I have no idea what it will be) I am so thankful for the restoration that has happened in my soul as a result of trusting and loving Jeff again. I mean, I’ve hurt him more than I have hurt anyone else in the world. We have torn each other down, and then buried us alive, and then helped us up only to shove us down again … you get the picture (despite awkward pronoun usage), it was bad. It is totally an act of God that we can let the past die and live as new creations mutually respecting and caring for one another. That may seem normal to most of you, but for us that is huge!
After this, I am so confident of God’s ability to redeem that which was lost, broken, stolen, or abused and that at the very heart of God there is a Redeemer. What is cool is that we didn’t go looking for this, on our own we would have continued in our self destructiveness, but as we sought Jesus for ourselves, He brought restoration to us together. He gave me this verse this morning as I was meditating on redemption and praying for Jeff:

Behold, I will bring it to health & healing, and I will heal them and reveal to them abundance of prosperity and security… I will cleanse them from all the guilt of their sin and I will forgive all the guilt of their sin and rebellion against me. And this city shall be to me a name of joy and praise and a glory before all the nations of the earth who shall hear the good that I do for them. Jeremiah 33: 6, 8-9.

I needed God to remind me that it is HIM who perfects and unifies, heals and cleanses. So, however this redemption story ends between us – it doesn’t matter, because we’re not the Author and the story isn’t even about us… I know this seems like a long story about us, but truly it is about the God who brought us here. Thanks be to God who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ!