falling into grace

t e s t i m o n y

"God was always there, He waited patiently for me to open the door and let Him in"

When I was two years old my family was going through what I like to call a dis functional phase; my Dad was reckless and liked to do as he pleased (going out with different girls, gambling and stuff like that) and my Mom didn't have anywhere else to go so she had to stay with his family even tho they weren't "together" anymore.

They thought it was a good idea to send me to kindergarten, so I could stay away from all that nonsense of relationship as much as I could. But thanks to God as the time passed my parents worked out their differences and got back together. When I turned four years old my parents decided that I needed a private tutor so I could "get ahead on the game" (They thought I was like a genius or something idk). So they hired one of the best teachers they could find and once again thanks to God for her because later on my life I realized that He used her to get to me.

But let's keep going with the story...

So this teacher was really good, that I learned how to read and write when I was only four, and for my country at least that was considered advanced (you normally start with writing only at five, preschool and reading / first grade at six). My parents loved this teacher for everything that she helped me to accomplish with only four years old, so when she told my parents that she found a job in a school and because of that she couldn't give me anymore private classes my parents practically begged her to stay. She said no, but she suggested that maybe they could send me to that school and I could eventually have classes with her, just in the company of other 20 kids. My parents said yes, almost immediately.

What my parents didn't know was that this school was actually a Christian school, but then again, they didn't really know what that meant. Both of my parents come from catholic families (like the 80% of the Latin American people), but they weren't religious at all. A lot of my classmates came from Christian families so they were already used to listen about Jesus every day of their lives, but I wasn't. To make it short I grew up listening about God and His word like any other Christian kid but once I was out of school it was another whole thing. My family had problems, my dad was still making reckless decisions and my mom was too gentle to say anything, there were a lot of discussions and fights over stupid things, and a lot of threats about leaving and all that toxic stuff. In school I leaned to read the bible, to pray, to worship but at home I always forgot about everything I learned in school because the problems were bigger, stronger and "more important".

When I was eleven my dad didn't come home for at least three days, no calls, no nothing. Mom knew something was happening so she took my little brother and I and called a cab, and she told us we were going to get dad back home.

"Did you find him?" You'll ask.

Yes, we did, but I wished we didn't, at least not in the way it happened. He was cheating on my mom with some girl from work, and we saw it. Everything.

I was eleven years old and my little brother was only six, I don't think he understood what was actually happening but I did. I was devastated. I was broken. The pain that I felt that day is one that I wouldn't like to feel ever again.

Some people might think "well, you'll forget about as time pass". Nope, even tho it's been a while since that have happened, I still remember how much it hurt, literally. I'm one of those people that remembers everything, specially if it's attached to something so emotional. So i do remember how it felt, and I promise that I'm not exaggerating anything.