I Am Loved & Cherished
Written by Kathleen George
From the Archives: The Journey Winter 2016
Growing up in the 50’s and 60’s my parents took my large family to a First Christian Church. It was a compromise between the two of them, as my father had a Baptist upbringing and my mother was Catholic, and I received Jesus as my Savior when I was a young girl. When I was 13 my parents divorced, which officially ended the era of family church attendance. About that same time period one of my sisters returned home after leaving with the carnival and heading to California. She subsequently ran into trouble and headed back home, bringing with her the hippie and drug culture. She and another older sister were so “cool” in my young teenage mind, and I looked up to them and their drug use in the way younger siblings tend to do. My mother was gone and my father worked nights; under such lax supervision I slipped into that pot smoking culture and all its accompanying bad choices for the next 20 years.
Throughout the years the Lord would put people on my path to invite me to church and pray for me. They popped up all over the map; in my hometown Kissimmee, FL, then Dallas, TX and Atlanta, GA where I moved with my work in the hotel industry. Moving through these towns I began to seek out Christianity in a new way. Once I took a Billy Graham Bible study course, which had scripture memory cards that you could save and I kept them in my purse many years. By the time I was in my early 30’s I was growing sick of the lifestyle I had chosen, and one day I pulled out those scripture memory cards and browsed through them. Matthew 6:33: (“Seek first the Kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you”) changed my life that day. In my mind, I thought that if I sought God and His righteousness first, then He would give me a good husband. So I cried out to God after many years of trying to go to church and falling away, “God how do I seek first Your kingdom? Please tell me what to do!” and in my heart I KNEW He spoke to me, encouraging to commit to read His Word. I trusted this heavenly advice and became determined to study the Bible. At the time I worked the early shift in the hotel business, so my new found commitment meant waking up at 4am to spend that time in the Word. I bought a Daily Walk Bible in the Living Bible version, to be better able to understand. It was divided into daily segments, and would help you to apply what you read to your life with a prayer guide. This is how I learned to ask God to lead me to a church where HE wanted me to be.
By then, I had given dating up to God. Though at work one day, there was a chef’s intern who asked my friend the baker if she thought I would go to dinner with him. When she told me that he was a Christian and only wanted to have someone to go to dinner with, I accepted. He invited me to a church that he was attending and I immediately felt that I had come home as soon as I stepped over the threshold.
Though that man wasn’t my future husband, he did bring me to the place that would change my life. I made friends with all the single ladies, and one of them said that when you pray for a husband make a list of all that you want and read it to God. I prayed and asked God for the husband HE would choose for me, asking that this man would love God first, so THEN he would know how to love me.
Sometime later, there was a guest speaker in our church while I was working in the nursery. One of my single friends came to tell me to quickly go into the sanctuary to be prayed over, as he was praying for the unmarried to find their mates. The idea didn’t sit well with me, and I told her that I didn’t need his prayers as I had already given any matchmaking to God. At the same time, almost everyone in my life was telling me that I was too picky and would end up an old maid if I didn’t get out and meet single men. But I knew that God was in control now, and in His timing, my husband and I would meet. I needed to become the person deserving of my future husband, and all my time spent learning God’s Word was doing just that.
It was several years after I found my home in the church that I was asked to lunch by Marion George. I was hesitant at first, but I went anyway and soon was sitting down to eat with him. Nearly the second we sat down at the table, I blurted out, “I just want you to know now that I was on drugs for 20 years and under the influence of the lifestyle that goes with it.” I don’t know why on earth I would say such a thing so soon, but I did. In retrospect Marion said he let that go in one ear and out the other, because before he had asked me on our date the Lord put on his heart that I would be his helpmate. It was perfect timing for both of us, as neither had had a perfect past. His wife had left him sometime before that, and he was about to go into the mountains and become a recluse, until God intervened with other plans.
One day Marion called at a time when I was very distressed. My sister was trying to talk me into moving back to my native Florida; and despite my trepidation I was tempted by her offer. The family I was living with had just had a baby, and though I felt the need to move on I was upset and confused by all the directions I was being pulled toward. Marion could hear my anxiety, and asked if everything was fine. I told him about the stress coming from every direction, and he told me not to panic. They might have been simple words, but when he reassured me I felt so safe. At that moment, I knew in my heart that he was going to be my husband.
A year later we were married, and 22 years later I still thank God everyday for answering my prayer for a husband who loves God first, because he sure knows how to love me. I tell Marion frequently that I am the most blessed wife in the whole world, for I know that I am loved, cherished and honored the way God intended. Marion learned this love from Ephesians 5:25: “Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ loved the church and gave himself for it.”
God has truly blessed me and “restored the years the locust had eaten” (Joel 2:25)!
