SECOND CHANCE

I was not a great parent. I don't say that with false humility. My story is one shared by many but told by few. Who wants to brag about being a bad parent?

The reason I've decided to share this painful admission publicly for all the world to see is twofold.

One, there are others out there living in the midst of the pain I experienced and I pray my story can be a light at the end of their seemingly endless tunnel. I want to bring hope to the hopeless.

Secondly, I hope to help those who have been raised in less than perfect homes to release anger and grudges that are like cancer in their souls. Living a truly fulfilling life cannot begin until we're willing to accept the cards we've been dealt and play our hands the best we can. As long as we hold onto resentment, the pain of our past will rule our lives. When we're able to let go, new life begins.

So let me begin.

You could go back to the beginning of time, really, to see where the cycle of abuse began. It started with the very first act of disobedience which opened the door for all of us to experience loss and pain. But my story really starts with my dad who was a brutally abusive alcoholic and a mother whose way of dealing with it was to run away. Today I know she did the right thing. When I was six, I didn't understand why I didn't get to see my Daddy anymore. He did some really bad things but he was still my Poppa Daddy and I loved him. Except for a brief encounter a year after we moved, I didn't see or hear from him again until I was seventeen.

Moving away was hard for me and my siblings. It meant starting over in a new school and new environment. The transition from Florida to Colorado was a major hurdle on a number of levels. I hated it. The only "friend" I made in our new home revoked her friendship at the slightest provocation and I never knew what I'd done to upset her. She had influence with other children and used it regularly to yank the rug out from under me.

Mom was extremely lucky and blessed by Granny's financial help to be able to buy a home a couple blocks from Denver University. Our neighbors were doctors, lawyers, news casters and other influential people. Mom worked as a writer for McGraw Hill publishing company. That might sound rather prestigious but as a woman, she wasn't well paid. We could not have afforded to live where we did without the help of Granny and an uncle who left Mom a bit of money. It was an old, run-down "fixer-upper" to the nth degree. She set to painting the rooms, ordered carpeting on credit, and made the place livable. We shopped at thrift stores and Mom knew how to pinch pennies to stretch every dollar.

The kids in the neighborhood were initially welcoming and wanted to get to know us. But when their parents invited Mom to join them for cocktails and she declined (not mentioning she was a recovering alcoholic) we became outcasts and the kids began to pick on us with name-calling and dirt clod attacks.

I grew up extremely insecure and longing for love, respect and acceptance.

In my youth I was fascinated by religion. My father was an only child raised in a Christian home where the rod was never spared and love was hard won. He did not carry on his parents' religion but relished the rod for discipline.

When my parents were separated and going through divorce, my sister and I were sent to stay with my father's parents. I was afraid of my grandmother and all I remember of my grandfather was that he was dying of leukemia.

I have a memory of walking down a long hallway holding my grandmother's hand, her tugging me as I whimpered, stumbling along behind her. We passed a great arched window of colored glass - a picture of Jesus holding a staff, a lamb around his shoulders. That moment of looking back over my shoulder as Grandmother yanked me forward, the sun streaming through the colored glass producing iridescent rays, is forever frozen in time for me.

At the end of the long hallway, Grandmother left me in a classroom where children were creating mosaic pictures with colored pebbles - the very same image of Jesus with a staff and lamb. They sang "Jesus Loves Me" as they worked. Despite all the chaos in my six-year-old life at the time, for a few moments I felt joy, peace, and love. To this day "Jesus Loves Me," moves me to tears.

At the age of eleven I began experimenting with drugs and alcohol and found another class of people who genuinely seemed to care. I was completely accepted just as I was. At warp speed I plummeted to unimaginable places, unspeakable horrors and near death experiences.

My best friend was a church-attending Episcopalian. I envied her family with their mealtime prayers and evening devotions. She hated the slavery of religion; I longed for that sense of purpose and belonging it promised to provide.

She sought the wild life of drugs and alcohol so I walked that path beside her.

Somehow I survived adolescence, only by the grace of God. Many times I faced certain death and always He sent angels to rescue me. Those stories are for another day.

I was drunk at a bar and having the time of my life when I met Len. It was the day before my twentieth birthday. We danced the night away and I stayed with him for a week. Len was the fourth child of thirteen from a Catholic farming family in South Dakota. It sounded so good, so right. Surely this was what I had longed for all my life.

At the end of a week together Len said he thought we should get married. Either hungover or drunk, it seemed like a good idea to me too. Four months later we were married in a Catholic church.

A few months after our wedding I studied the doctrine and was confirmed in the Catholic church. I'd finally found religion.

Eighteen months later our first son was born. Michael had a birth defect and needed two surgeries. He remained hospitalized for the first six weeks of his life. Although I spent twelve or more hours of every day sitting in the hospital at his little crib, holding his tiny hand, and praying for him, we failed to bond.

All the dreams I'd had of marrying my knight in shining armor, a holy life as a good Catholic with lots of little children, began to crumble as I felt utterly unequipped to meet the needs of this tiny, damaged infant and his demanding father. So once again I turned to alcohol to numb the pain and bolster my security.

After ten years, three sons, hundreds of fights and a roller coaster ride in a nightmare, it ended when Len nearly killed me in a drunken rage one night. Let's not give any false impression that I didn't push any buttons. It takes two to rumble after all.

After our divorce Len began stalking me which drove me to leave the state.

First I moved to Arizona for a couple years, trusting Len to take care of the boys temporarily. I hoped eventually to bring them to Phoenix but I could never earn enough money to make it happen. When an opportunity opened in San Diego paying three times my current salary, I thought it was the answer to my prayers. After I moved to California I quickly learned three times the pay didn't matter when the cost of living was four times greater! It was all I could do to rent a room and eat three meals a day.

I soon realized the root of all my troubles was alcohol. Getting sober opened my eyes to many mistakes I'd made, but the worst was leaving my kids with any expectation of getting them back. Len's lawyer accused me of abandonment and Len made sure the kids believed everything bad in their lives was my fault. The best I could do was summer visitation with them, one at a time. With their father sowing lies of hatred into them nine months of the year and me trying to undo all the damage in three months, it was a losing battle.

Lance was just three when we divorced, Nich was five and Michael was nine.

Through my AA associations I pursued all sorts of bizarre religions and no religion at all. Faith in traditional Christianity was pushed to the back burner and turned off. Then I met Steve.

I was in a bad relationship, living with a sober but utterly insane alcoholic. Steve managed a house with three rooms for rent. There was a couple living in one room and a single guy in another. When the single guy moved out, I moved in and Steve and I became best friends.

I had prayed one night just before going to sleep, "Lord, if you want me to be celibate for the rest of my life, I'm willing. Just tell me what you want me to do." Soon after I developed a strong attraction for Steve and he for me. One thing led to another and then he asked me to marry him.

We were engaged for nearly two years, taking our time to find the right venue and person to preside over our ceremony. During one of our visits to a church to check out the minister, we heard the gospel message and committed our lives to follow Jesus. We began attending weekly worship services and Bible studies and our lives changed in ways we'd never imagined.

I studied the Bible with an insatiable appetite. After years of study, prayer and counsel, I began to repair relationships with my grown sons. There is still a lot of healing to be done but we're on the road to recovery.

One of my biggest obstacles in my Christian walk has been reaching my oldest son who has struggled with various addictions. When he moved to the Denver area a couple years ago, I was both thrilled and concerned. He'd been burning bridges along the way and I wondered if he was finally ready to settle down, get a job and become a fruitful, contributing citizen.

I had just joined a Bible study on blessings a week after he moved here. By the end of that first meeting, I felt a strong compulsion to go see Michael and say a blessing over him. I called and asked if I could take him to lunch that day, explaining that I realized I had never said a blessing over him and, if he would allow me, I'd like to do that. He was willing. The Bible study ladies all prayed for me before I left.

As I was driving down Broadway I continued to pray, nervous about our encounter and asking God for guidance. I wept, confessing to God that I should have stayed with my children when my ex-husband was stalking me rather than running away. Those kids needed me and I was selfish. I wanted another chance to show my kids I cared, to love them the way they deserved to be loved, to be a good mom.

As I was driving, I saw a car in my periphery about to turn from a side-street on a red light. I'm thinking, in the midst of this humble prayer, "jerk, you better not pull in front of me and make me hit my brakes!" Sure enough, he made the right turn onto Broadway right in front of me and I had to slow down so I wouldn't hit him - close enough to read his license plate surround: "SECOND + CHANCE." The symbol between the words was a cross, not a plus sign. I knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, God was sending me a clear message. "Anne, this is your second chance. I'm here with you. I've always been with you. Follow me."

After I took him to lunch I drove up to Red Rocks where I blessed Michael and we wept together. It started us on a new journey together that continues today. He's not out of the woods yet but I have the assurance that God is in control, He cares more about my kids than I ever could and He is the God of mercy and miracles.

An acquaintance caught me at church one Sunday and said she'd like to get together for coffee to get to know each other better. We enjoyed coffee and muffins at my kitchen table the next week.

After about an hour of chit chat Judy suddenly announced she'd been watching Steve and me and thought we'd be good foster parents. I laughed out loud. Surely she's insane, I thought. Does she have any idea who she's talking to? I couldn't even raise my own kids. Besides, I manage a traveling prayer ministry. There's just no way. But, to be fair, I thought, I really should give this to God and let Him lead the way. "I'll talk to Steve and we'll pray about it," I said to Judy.

I talked to Steve that night, thinking he would immediately shut me down. But he was quite open to the idea. While we were talking I heard a quiet voice say, "SECOND CHANCE."

Steve and I decided to start the process to become foster parents just to see what would happen. If we didn't pass muster, we'd know it wasn't meant to be. Each step of the way as we completed mountains of forms, sat through interviews, got fingerprinted and had our home inspected, I kept hearing that voice, "SECOND CHANCE."

Then one night as we were near the finish and I was getting really nervous that we might actually be taking strange kids into our home, I had an argument with my Lord. Why do I keep hearing "SECOND CHANCE" in my head? Wasn't that about building relationships with my kids? How can taking foster kids make any difference to my sons' lives?

God spoke clearly to my heart. I am the God of Second Chances. Did I not give Job another family and even more than he'd had before it was all taken away? Did I not allow Noah to take his family with him and renew the earth after the flood? Did I not bless David with Solomon after Bathsheba's child died? Did I not give Sarah her hearts desire in her old age?

God who created the universe is the God of second chances. He's the God who gave His only beloved son so that we could all have second chances to become the people He intended us to be. Our children are not our children at all - they're HIS.

Now He's given me a second chance to restore the years the locusts have eaten by taking care of children who have been abandoned, abused, and traded for drugs and alcohol. Here is my chance to nurture, encourage, support and love those who are most in need.

Mark 9:37 "Whoever welcomes one of these little children in my name welcomes me; and whoever welcomes me, does not welcome me but the one who sent me."

Whoever you are, whatever you've been through, whether you think of yourself as a victim or feel like you've done irreperable harm to others, there is nothing God can't handle, nothing He can't carry you through, no wound too deep to heal.

My continual prayer for you...

If you've been victimized, that you will find forgiveness in your heart and move past the pain so you can have a productive life and bless others.

If you've hurt someone deeply in such a way you feel you can never amend, that you will trust God to do the healing, seek his forgiveness, accept His forgiveness and go where He would have you sow goodness into the lives of other damaged people.

If you've stood in judgment of parents who've fallen prey to the ravages alcohol and/or drug abuse, that you would see them through God's eyes: sick, hurt, broken and in need of a Savior. Pray for them and help where you can with a hand or encouraging word.

If you're holding a grudge against someone in your life who harmed or failed you in some way, that you will be able to let it go and find healing in yourself to stop the cancer of resentment from eating away at your soul, which will ultimately take years off your life.

May God bless your eyes to see the world through His; your ears to hear Him speak; your heart to seek His will for your life; your mind to meditate on His goodness and mercy; your hands to reach out with love; your body to be dedicated to His purposes; your feet to go where He leads.