Brenda, Age 44: Stepping Out of the Boat

   Brenda treated God like a smorgasbord: she would go to Him when she needed Him, get filled up, and then forget about Him when things were going well. She cannot remember a time when she didn’t believe in God. He was always there. Church and various Christian activities had become a matter of habit over the years (rather than a matter of the heart). She had “head knowledge” about God, but she wasn’t living for Him.

   As a result of not surrendering her heart to God, she became pregnant while still in college.  Brenda and her boyfriend married. Her husband is a warm-hearted, generous man, but he is not a believer.  Although compatible in every other way, the spiritual connection has always been absent. The spiritual chasm in their marriage has sometimes led Brenda away from the Lord.

   Because she was busy being a wife and mother to her three little boys, Brenda didn’t always take time out for God. Throughout an eight-year period when her boys were very young, she didn’t go to church -- she just couldn’t get herself and the boys ready for church all by herself. Exhausted from daily life, Brenda lost her connection to God. She had no support system.

   As her boys got older, Brenda went to work full-time. With a great job and family, life was perfect -- from the outside. But Brenda was still missing the boat when it came to God. Knowing there was something absent ...