I spent 5 years going to Sunday School faithfully every week and hearing more about Jesus. By this time I had a Bible that I asked my parents to give me and a New Testament that they gave out in schools in grade 5. In the back of the bible it was very clearly presented, with scriptures the way to salvation. There was a place to sign my name and date when I made a decision to receive Christ as my Lord and Saviour. This was dated January 3, 1958.
One day, I was told we would be moving, I was in the middle of grade five, almost 11 years old. We moved to Burnaby and I found the local Church and started attending Sunday School there. My new friends, who were not really into going came along. I joined a young people’s group for girls. CGIT, (Canadian Girls In Training). I found it boring after awhile and along with my friends, I would spend time hiding in the bathroom or going to the store across the Street. We moved again and I stopped going to the groups at the Church shortly afterwards.
During my teen years I never went to Church or recall thinking about God. I did the usual things teens did during the early 1960’s. I tried smoking, lied about staying at a friend’s place so I could sleep over night at the Empire Statium to be first in tine to buy my Beatles Ticket for the Concert in August. I listened to Rock and Roll music and sometimes I read True Confessions Magazines that I hid under my mattress
My friend and I went berry picking and stayed in a cabin with 2 girls of another faith. My friend was an active Christian, and she would get into discussions with them every evening. I took it all in, that is, what my friend was saying. I knew what was Truth when I heard it. The scripture says, “I am the way, the truth and the life; no man cometh unto the Father but by me”. John 14:6.
It was to take a few more years for me to reach out to, God.
I eventually met someone at a night club, after I had moved away from home and I lived on my own. I dated him for two years. We were married just before my 21st Birthday. Things started to happen in our marriage that I couldn’t understand or fix, although I tried. Being a single parent was not at all common in the 1960s. So when I discovered I was pregnant, I felt trapped in this scary world, with a husband who was mentally ill. My first daughter was born the following year.
For the first year with a new baby, things went fairly well. I thought everything would be fine. Shortly after my daughter turned 1 year old, things started to flare up again in our home. I just couldn’t cope with the emotional roller coaster I was on. One day thinking everything was fine, then the next, my husband wasn’t well.
Out of necessity, I turned once again to God.