My mother, my hero
My home church back in Texas has a newsletter they put out every month and recently my mother was asked to share her "testimony". For those unfamiliar with Christian-ese that's means your testimony to what God has done for you in your life or how he has provided, etc, simply put a personal testament to God's work in one's life.
She recently emailed me her rough draft and it's anything but rough. It's warm, it's touching and it's all true.
Yet another example of why she's my hero.
I always tease, saying "I am my mother's daughter", when I finish her sentence or when people remark on our resemblance. But honestly that is something I strive to be, a reflection of my mother, her gracious attitude and her earnest desire to be a good and honest person.
It reads as followed:
~~
Thanks and Giving - by Gay Brookshire (unedited version submitted for Surveyor11/05)
“I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you (us) does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him. (Romans 12:3-5, The Message)
There are so many times when God has shown me that he is my provision. He has brought me through some incredible storms in my life and some very trying seasons. For that and so much more I am grateful.
One season of my life that stands out is when, at 28, I left an abusive, alcoholic husband and found myself a divorced mother of two, struggling to take care of my little family by myself. I moved to Whitehouse and worked in Tyler as a hairdresser. I received no child support and soon found myself scrambling to make ends meet.
I learned a lot. I learned about the WIC program (Women, Infants, & Children), the Free Lunch program at school, how to apply for and use Food Stamps and Medicaid, how to say “yes” when the GA (Girls in Action) sponsor called and offered me a Thanksgiving Basket that my own daughter had contributed canned goods to. I learned how to get rides when your car breaks down and how to swap haircuts for car repairs, babysitting and piano lessons. I learned how to answer my kids when they asked if we were poor now. I learned that you can live without Nintendos and Nikes and I learned that I can stretch a dollar like nobody’s business! I learned that my friends’ children were afraid to come to where I lived to watch my kids and sometimes my children’s friends were not allowed to come over because the parents were afraid of where we lived.
I learned that turning out the lights and peeking through your blinds on a Friday or Saturday night was as entertaining as any “Cops” show on TV. And it’s free! I learned what I can live with and what I can live without, very quickly. In short, I learned, as Blanche Dubois put it so well, how “to rely upon the kindnesses of others”. I learned that I had to. I also learned to swallow my pride and ask for help and all the time, I felt like a colossal mooch.
On the bright side, my children and I stayed in church and I also learned that without my faith in God and my church family and my friends there to give me a ‘hand up’ I would never have made it. I also learned that I qualified for financial aid, which enabled me to go back to school. I learned that there were others around that were willing to lend a hand with my education as well. While in school, I even learned that I could get paid (via music scholarship) to sing with the UTT choir! I had a ‘hand up’ offered to me lots of times. Still, in my mind, I was a single mother, cutting hair, studying, singing, and going to church-but I was still a mooch.
Until one day while at work, a lady I’d known for some time approached me. She came right up to me and said, “Gay, I’ve figured out who you are!” And I said, “of course you know who I am, I’ve worked here for at least two years, I’m Gay!” She went on to explain that she’d figured out that I was ‘her daughter, Kim’s friend Gay’. The Gay she always talked about, the Gay who said she couldn’t survive without her relationship to Jesus, and the Gay that had encouraged her to finally go back to church. She said that she and her husband had tried and tried to get their daughter back to church but finally gave it to God and asked him to send her someone she would listen to. Kim happened to also be a divorced mom with 3 boys, whose ex-husband was an alcoholic, and she lived in my same apartments. That’s how we came to be friends.
Then the lady said these words to me: “You are literally an answered prayer for my husband and I. You are God’s Provision for us.” And she thanked me and said some other stuff I don’t recall because all I could hear, over and over, was “you are God’s Provision for us”! Imagine that!
After all this time, I certainly always knew that God was taking care of me and I was thankful for it but, I still felt like a mooch. And then what does God do? He comes right into that salon and says, “No, you are not a mooch! For right now, these are my provisions for you (Jer. 29:11). And by the way, in the meantime, YOU are also my provision for someone else, so don’t be a slacker. Being poor doesn’t mean I can’t use you. In this case, it’s how I am using you.”
Well, I just stood there folding towels and crying because I knew that I’d just heard a word from God. That He cared so much about me that he not only provided salvation for my lost and dying soul, and for my family’s basic needs, he also loved me so much that he provided an ointment and a blessing to sooth the wound that was my shame -when providing for my soul and needs should have and would have been enough. Wow!
Well, that was a rather pivotal point in my life, spiritually. After that I didn’t feel like such a mooch. I still didn’t dance a jig when I used my food stamps and I still didn’t love being poor. But I always knew and still know that I am a beloved child of God. And he provides for my EVERY need, even my emotional ones. Jehovah Jireh.
I eventually graduated from UT Tyler with my Masters in Clinical Psychology. I went to work full time as a prison psychologist at Skyview Prision Unit in Rusk, where I received a very nice salary with benefits (and was able to officially withdraw from public assistance of any kind). I eventually met and married this really great guy (at Green Acres, in my singles department) whose family happens to own the grocery stores where I spent my food stamps. (I am also thankful for God’s great sense of humor, aren’t you?) My sweet husband Kirk adopted my two girls and then we even had another baby (a girl!).
Well, you can imagine my incredible, enormous, overflowing Gratitude! (THANKS, God!) Just look at what God has given me. I can do nothing else but to give it back to him. And as for me, when I overflow, it generally comes out of my mouth first, as I love to sing. But often, it comes out through my hands, or my heart, or my purse, or my time as well. I believe that whatever you do from overflow becomes (or is the manifestation of) WORSHIP. You can’t help yourself! You can’t stop yourself!!
In addition to my involvement in the music ministry at Green Acres (my church) and helping with 12 grade Sunday school (with ya’ll), which have both been such a joy for me, one of the things I do from overflow is my involvement with a ministry called Christian Women’s Job Corps. I’ve taught classes, helped interview prospective students, brought lunches and currently serve as Board Chair. It is a ministry that helps women move from dependency to self-sufficiency by giving them job and life skills from a Biblical perspective. I get to tell them “Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. And he loves you too!” I love our motto because it hits me right in my heart (and my experience). “A Hand Up, Not A Hand Out”. I like to encourage the ladies to use one hand to reach for that ‘hand up’ while the other hand reaches back to be a ‘hand up’ for the next one that comes behind them. That’s how God provides for us and uses us at the same time. I love that picture.
Another thing I love is just encouraging women in general. My mission statement is “to encourage myself and the women around me to (find and) use their God given powers for good.” That came from my motto and what I’ve always taught my daughters to do…”use your powers for good”. Of course, they sometimes roll their eyes at me, but I think they get it. I know because I see them doing it! I’ve even heard them saying it to their own friends! Some women have yet to figure out they have powers, much less that they’re supposed to use them.
This whole thing led me to exploring stewardship in general. I’m just on a journey with that right now. That’s how RSVP - Women Responding to God’s Call, began. It’s a group of women who are exploring what it means to embrace the unique and sacred trust of what God has given each one of us (in terms of time, talent, treasures, circumstance, seasons of life, etc.). What are we doing with what God has given us? (And it all comes from GOD!) How are we investing in the Kingdom?
For me the whole thing looks like a big continuous circle where God reaches down and gives me his hand (his provision), I use it and then I pass it along by being God’s provision for someone else. And God has given me so many opportunities to pull someone else along. I can’t count them all!
You just never know when something you say or do will be a witness, a blessing or a gift to another person; their provision (from God). At first, we may mistakenly think it’s from us and it’s our good deed. But don’t be seduced by that idea. We can only do and give from what we ourselves have received. And every good and perfect thing is from God. We’re just His instruments. (Remember Baalam’s Ass?) But He does use us and when He does, we get to share in the joy that comes from partnering with our Creator! We don’t always know how or when. But don’t wait to find out. Just go out and “use your powers for good!” (and for God). And see if out of your thanks comes giving and then out of your giving comes thanks.
Peace, Love and My Hero
She recently emailed me her rough draft and it's anything but rough. It's warm, it's touching and it's all true.
Yet another example of why she's my hero.
I always tease, saying "I am my mother's daughter", when I finish her sentence or when people remark on our resemblance. But honestly that is something I strive to be, a reflection of my mother, her gracious attitude and her earnest desire to be a good and honest person.
It reads as followed:
~~
Thanks and Giving - by Gay Brookshire (unedited version submitted for Surveyor11/05)
“I’m speaking to you out of deep gratitude for all that God has given me, and especially as I have responsibilities in relation to you. Living then, as every one of you (us) does, in pure grace, it’s important that you not misinterpret yourselves as people who are bringing this goodness to God. No, God brings it all to you. The only accurate way to understand ourselves is by what God is and by what he does for us, not by what we are and what we do for him. (Romans 12:3-5, The Message)
There are so many times when God has shown me that he is my provision. He has brought me through some incredible storms in my life and some very trying seasons. For that and so much more I am grateful.
One season of my life that stands out is when, at 28, I left an abusive, alcoholic husband and found myself a divorced mother of two, struggling to take care of my little family by myself. I moved to Whitehouse and worked in Tyler as a hairdresser. I received no child support and soon found myself scrambling to make ends meet.
I learned a lot. I learned about the WIC program (Women, Infants, & Children), the Free Lunch program at school, how to apply for and use Food Stamps and Medicaid, how to say “yes” when the GA (Girls in Action) sponsor called and offered me a Thanksgiving Basket that my own daughter had contributed canned goods to. I learned how to get rides when your car breaks down and how to swap haircuts for car repairs, babysitting and piano lessons. I learned how to answer my kids when they asked if we were poor now. I learned that you can live without Nintendos and Nikes and I learned that I can stretch a dollar like nobody’s business! I learned that my friends’ children were afraid to come to where I lived to watch my kids and sometimes my children’s friends were not allowed to come over because the parents were afraid of where we lived.
I learned that turning out the lights and peeking through your blinds on a Friday or Saturday night was as entertaining as any “Cops” show on TV. And it’s free! I learned what I can live with and what I can live without, very quickly. In short, I learned, as Blanche Dubois put it so well, how “to rely upon the kindnesses of others”. I learned that I had to. I also learned to swallow my pride and ask for help and all the time, I felt like a colossal mooch.
On the bright side, my children and I stayed in church and I also learned that without my faith in God and my church family and my friends there to give me a ‘hand up’ I would never have made it. I also learned that I qualified for financial aid, which enabled me to go back to school. I learned that there were others around that were willing to lend a hand with my education as well. While in school, I even learned that I could get paid (via music scholarship) to sing with the UTT choir! I had a ‘hand up’ offered to me lots of times. Still, in my mind, I was a single mother, cutting hair, studying, singing, and going to church-but I was still a mooch.
Until one day while at work, a lady I’d known for some time approached me. She came right up to me and said, “Gay, I’ve figured out who you are!” And I said, “of course you know who I am, I’ve worked here for at least two years, I’m Gay!” She went on to explain that she’d figured out that I was ‘her daughter, Kim’s friend Gay’. The Gay she always talked about, the Gay who said she couldn’t survive without her relationship to Jesus, and the Gay that had encouraged her to finally go back to church. She said that she and her husband had tried and tried to get their daughter back to church but finally gave it to God and asked him to send her someone she would listen to. Kim happened to also be a divorced mom with 3 boys, whose ex-husband was an alcoholic, and she lived in my same apartments. That’s how we came to be friends.
Then the lady said these words to me: “You are literally an answered prayer for my husband and I. You are God’s Provision for us.” And she thanked me and said some other stuff I don’t recall because all I could hear, over and over, was “you are God’s Provision for us”! Imagine that!
After all this time, I certainly always knew that God was taking care of me and I was thankful for it but, I still felt like a mooch. And then what does God do? He comes right into that salon and says, “No, you are not a mooch! For right now, these are my provisions for you (Jer. 29:11). And by the way, in the meantime, YOU are also my provision for someone else, so don’t be a slacker. Being poor doesn’t mean I can’t use you. In this case, it’s how I am using you.”
Well, I just stood there folding towels and crying because I knew that I’d just heard a word from God. That He cared so much about me that he not only provided salvation for my lost and dying soul, and for my family’s basic needs, he also loved me so much that he provided an ointment and a blessing to sooth the wound that was my shame -when providing for my soul and needs should have and would have been enough. Wow!
Well, that was a rather pivotal point in my life, spiritually. After that I didn’t feel like such a mooch. I still didn’t dance a jig when I used my food stamps and I still didn’t love being poor. But I always knew and still know that I am a beloved child of God. And he provides for my EVERY need, even my emotional ones. Jehovah Jireh.
I eventually graduated from UT Tyler with my Masters in Clinical Psychology. I went to work full time as a prison psychologist at Skyview Prision Unit in Rusk, where I received a very nice salary with benefits (and was able to officially withdraw from public assistance of any kind). I eventually met and married this really great guy (at Green Acres, in my singles department) whose family happens to own the grocery stores where I spent my food stamps. (I am also thankful for God’s great sense of humor, aren’t you?) My sweet husband Kirk adopted my two girls and then we even had another baby (a girl!).
Well, you can imagine my incredible, enormous, overflowing Gratitude! (THANKS, God!) Just look at what God has given me. I can do nothing else but to give it back to him. And as for me, when I overflow, it generally comes out of my mouth first, as I love to sing. But often, it comes out through my hands, or my heart, or my purse, or my time as well. I believe that whatever you do from overflow becomes (or is the manifestation of) WORSHIP. You can’t help yourself! You can’t stop yourself!!
In addition to my involvement in the music ministry at Green Acres (my church) and helping with 12 grade Sunday school (with ya’ll), which have both been such a joy for me, one of the things I do from overflow is my involvement with a ministry called Christian Women’s Job Corps. I’ve taught classes, helped interview prospective students, brought lunches and currently serve as Board Chair. It is a ministry that helps women move from dependency to self-sufficiency by giving them job and life skills from a Biblical perspective. I get to tell them “Jesus loves me this I know, for the Bible tells me so. And he loves you too!” I love our motto because it hits me right in my heart (and my experience). “A Hand Up, Not A Hand Out”. I like to encourage the ladies to use one hand to reach for that ‘hand up’ while the other hand reaches back to be a ‘hand up’ for the next one that comes behind them. That’s how God provides for us and uses us at the same time. I love that picture.
Another thing I love is just encouraging women in general. My mission statement is “to encourage myself and the women around me to (find and) use their God given powers for good.” That came from my motto and what I’ve always taught my daughters to do…”use your powers for good”. Of course, they sometimes roll their eyes at me, but I think they get it. I know because I see them doing it! I’ve even heard them saying it to their own friends! Some women have yet to figure out they have powers, much less that they’re supposed to use them.
This whole thing led me to exploring stewardship in general. I’m just on a journey with that right now. That’s how RSVP - Women Responding to God’s Call, began. It’s a group of women who are exploring what it means to embrace the unique and sacred trust of what God has given each one of us (in terms of time, talent, treasures, circumstance, seasons of life, etc.). What are we doing with what God has given us? (And it all comes from GOD!) How are we investing in the Kingdom?
For me the whole thing looks like a big continuous circle where God reaches down and gives me his hand (his provision), I use it and then I pass it along by being God’s provision for someone else. And God has given me so many opportunities to pull someone else along. I can’t count them all!
You just never know when something you say or do will be a witness, a blessing or a gift to another person; their provision (from God). At first, we may mistakenly think it’s from us and it’s our good deed. But don’t be seduced by that idea. We can only do and give from what we ourselves have received. And every good and perfect thing is from God. We’re just His instruments. (Remember Baalam’s Ass?) But He does use us and when He does, we get to share in the joy that comes from partnering with our Creator! We don’t always know how or when. But don’t wait to find out. Just go out and “use your powers for good!” (and for God). And see if out of your thanks comes giving and then out of your giving comes thanks.
Peace, Love and My Hero