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The Real Life of a Pastor's Wife
by Filoiann Wiedenhoff
May 25, 2010
Category: Christian Living |   HO ME?
WHO WOULD have thought that God, in His all knowing and all surpassing power, have a plan for me to be married to a pastor. If you knew me twenty five years ago you probably would have thought the exact opposite and would have said, "No Way! Not her..." I want to introduce myself by sharing with you how I came to know Jesus Christ. Apart from Him I can do nothing.
I remember back as a young teenage girl I was lost and looking for something I didn't know. All I did know was that I was in dire need of hope. I lost my mother at the young age of thirteen. My father David, three brothers, Jaffa, John and James and I were devastated to say the least. She was truly the heart of our home and when she died a big part of us died too. It felt like our world was crashing down all around us. I looked for comfort in many different ways through alcohol, partying and people; hoping to find happiness but found myself feeling lonely, brokenhearted and depressed instead.
I kept thinking to myself that there had to be more to this life but I just could not seem to find it. I was so discouraged and thought to my self if this is what life was about I didn't want anything to do with it. So one night I was going to attempt suicide for the second time. I was seventeen and had just graduated from high school the month before. I attempted suicide once before and decided not to go through with it but the idea kept coming back and so in the darkness of my bedroom I began to plan my next attempt.
I was distraught wondering if my death would bring me the peace I was looking for but then a question came to mind. What if all the things Christians had witnessed to me in the past about salvation and hell were right? I had to ask myself if I would be going to a better place or a worse place and did I really believe there was a God and heaven or was it all a myth?
These questions came one after the other and I didn't know what to think. Right at that moment everything people witnessed to me over the years about Jesus Christ and salvation came flooding into my mind. It was as if it was stored in my memory bank for this very moment to be released because I remembered every single word and instruction on how to receive salvation through Jesus Christ. The crazy thing about it is that these were memories I didn't know I had.
I distinctly remembered that I was to ask Jesus to come into my heart and take over my life and He will come in and live inside my heart and also that He would give me a new life in Him. I also remember a friend telling me once that if I wanted to know if God was real that I should ask Him to reveal Himself to me and that He would do just that.
I began to feel a sense of hope and reasoned to myself that perhaps it would be unwise for me not to exhaust every option of life before considering the finality of suicide. So I decided that I should give belief in God a try first and see if what I was told about faith and God was true
That night in my bedroom, with the lights still off, I cried my heart out and asked Jesus to come into my heart and if He was indeed real that He would show Himself to me so that I could believe. I asked God to forgive me of my sins and to forgive the sins that were done to me and told Him if He was real I desperately wanted to know.
After that heartfelt prayer I felt as if a large weight was lifted off my shoulders and more at peace with myself but I still didn't quite know if what I had prayed was real or if God was real but the desire to commit suicide seemed to diminish.
A week later after I prayed that prayer my brothers came home from the store one day and told me about three girls they met. They told me they invited them over to meet me because they were my age and before I could tear into to them for treating me like a charity case; I hear a knock on the door. It was them, Lynne, Norma and Vivian. They invited me to hang out with them and play some basketball; I reluctantly went not thinking anything of it but that night we immediately bonded. It was as if I had known them my whole life.
We had a lot in common and the best news was they were all Christian and when I heard that I immediately told them about my prayer the week before. Lynne prayed with me again and explained to me about faith and the decision that I made for Christ. It felt like a veil was lifted from my eyes and I could see life differently. She took me under her wing and mentored me the following two years and we all became best friends. I had joy, peace and purpose for life again and from that night forward I knew with my whole heart that God was indeed real, He heard my cries and answered me and transformed me anew.
My testimonial song for my life is, "Amazing Grace". "Amazing grace how sweet the sound who saved a wretch like me, I once was lost but now I'm found, once blind but now I see."
I will share more about me in my next article on how I met my husband. You don't want to miss that one, it's a miracle too.
One valuable lesson I learned from this testimony is that no matter how you may see your self, where you may be at this moment or what you have done in the past; God sees you and views you through His eyes and will take you out of that miry pit and set you upon a rock and make you new through His Son Jesus Christ. God Bless You!
Jeremiah 33:3
"Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know." NKJV
Filoiann Wiedenhoff is a Pastor’s Wife, Work at Home Mom, Woman’s Biblical Counselor, Bible Teacher and Writer. You can subscribe to her monthly newsletter and visit her website.More columns by Filoiann Wiedenhoff
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