Eating Your Words

If you live long enough, you may have the opportunity to see that you were correct with some of your assertions during your youth. The other side of that is experiences in your personal life that help you to see how wrong and misguided you were. I realize not everyone has experienced that feeling, and I can only speak from my firsthand experiences.

At this point, I need to say that I know God is in control of everything and knows about everything that happens. I know that He gives us “free will” and that allows us to choose our actions throughout our lives. Therefore, He does not “control” or make our decisions. The more we understand Him and follow His lead, the more our actions will take us on the path He has for us. Even when we choose a different option, He never leaves us as we walk in another direction.

As a teenager and young adult, I expressed my opinions on various topics. I thought I knew all I needed to know about the subjects and was comfortable enough to discuss them. I did not know what I did not know, and that was the problem. There are two basic ways that we learn anything in life: from the experiences of others and from firsthand experiences. From others, it could be from reading or seeing things in the general population, and causing you to either increase your beliefs or to realize you did not see all the details to properly form your opinion. From a personal perspective, when it affects your family or close friends, that up-close view can get your attention a lot more than 20 seconds on the News.

I have changed my views on many issues, but today I want to discuss abortion, drinking, and domestic violence. I have written about each of these subjects in greater detail in other posts, but I wanted to show how personal experience can force you to learn things you did not consider before.

Abortion: As a teenager, I did not know anyone that had an abortion, but I knew many families had children with various disabilities, women with serious problems during pregnancy, cases of incest and rape, unplanned pregnancies, and children in adoption homes waiting to be adopted. Naive as I was, I viewed abortion as an option that could reduce a lot of suffering. When I married Eva, I learned that she had a younger brother whom I did not know about. He was born with a serious disability and was never able to take care of his basic needs. That information helped me know more about Eva and the person she was, but my view did not change much until Eva took our daughters to see her brother on occasions, and I listened to how my daughters talked about their time with him. They did not see him with all of what he could not do; they saw him able to smile and be excited to see them. Until then, I did not see God’s bigger picture.

After having our first daughter and holding that little human that was part Eva and part me, I could no longer accept abortion as a birth control option for planning a family; however, I still thought in the case of incest and rape it should be an option. I also thought that if the woman’s life was at risk and there was no other option, then the option should be available. As I got older and stronger in my faith, I learn about situations where it was clear that God used children born under those conditions to show how they can add so much to others’ lives and to the world. Having reached that conclusion, I was still playing with others’ emotions. Choosing life requires strong faith and commitment to value all that can be gained, which is greater than the chance to forget the trauma that brought you to that decision. That unwed mother may just be a person with greater faith than you might think.

Drinking: As a teenager, I never saw my dad drink any alcoholic drinks, including beer. I was sure my older brother drank, movies and TV shows included drinking, and they made it look cool. It was the same with smoking; it was everywhere. In Texas, you had to be twenty-one to drink or buy alcohol legally, but there were ways around that. My view was that as long as you did not do stupid things and did not spend money you did not have, it was OK. After watching families being torn apart due to alcohol and understanding why Eva felt the way she did about alcohol, I realized I could not identify anything positive that alcohol added to my life. I have not had any alcohol in 47 years. I was asked many times why I do not drink. I answered, my faith. It is that, but more of a change I made for Eva. We both knew I was willing to do something for her, even though she never asked me to.

Domestic Violence: I was always appalled by the cases of domestic violence that I would see on the news and in movies. The number of women abused or even killed when it was not the first time, was something I could not understand. Hardly a week goes by in Houston that we do not see another case where a woman or child has been killed by a monster in their home. For years, I assumed that the woman would leave that terrible life if she wanted to. I also believed that extended family members could help if they cared enough.

I have written in painful detail about how my views were changed toward the victims. It had to be personal for me to look at it with all its horror. When the strongest feeling you have left is to want to kill the monster, but you cannot because you must protect your loved ones from the monster. To understand how it can be hidden from you, even by the monster’s family.

God does not make these things happen in our lives, but He is there to help us get through these storms we face and will make us stronger to face the next storm. Our experiences are the most painful way to learn God’s truth and it is also the wisdom that will stay with you until you pass on to the next life.