A Story That Will Stay With You

You’ve heard of the six degrees of separation right? You know, it is the concept that any two people on Earth are about six acquaintance links apart. Well I grew up in a fairly small town. There wasn’t six degrees of separation. There was six degrees of connection. I am serious. You didn’t just know someone by one particular way. Not only did you go to school with that person but your dad was a client of their mother, you ate dinner every Thursday at their uncle’s restaurant, your best friend went to church with them, your aunt played Bunco with them once a month and at one time they lived in your neighborhood. This sounds like an exaggeration but honestly I had several connections with every person I knew growing up in Florence, AL.

Sometimes you may not have known someone really well but you were connected to them (and again by multiple ways). Sometimes these connections would have something happen to them and their story would stick with you. I think of several people who had horrific things happen to them and their story stayed with me. One of those people for me was a lady named Rachel. She was Miss University of North Alabama when I was in middle school which was during the time my dad drug me to all the football games. She sang solos at our church. My mom worked with her sister (who I became really close to at the time) and then later with Rachel’s mother. She went to church at Highland Baptist where a lot of my friends went to church. And her mother taught many of my friends in elementary school. I think you are getting the point. It was a small town.

Because of great tragedies in Rachel’s life, her name has been mentioned from my Florence friends and my mother throughout the years. Her story is one I think of pretty often to just be connected to her.  Rachel’s heartache began in her early 20’s. She was newlywed, married to her college sweetheart. On a normal Sunday afternoon, her husband was playing basketball in a friend’s driveway and died of aneurysm.  Our entire community was devastated. It was unimaginable to think of Rachel as a widow before her mid 20’s.

Rachel later re-married. Everyone was so excited for Rachel. Then the unthinkable happened a few years after they married. Rachel became a widow for the second time. She lost her second husband in a plane crash, leaving her to raise two small children on her own. While this story is devastating, Rachel has not allowed it to be. Rachel now spends her time ministering to women. And because I could never do her story justice, I hope you would take the time to listen to her testimony. I am so glad someone posted this link on Facebook from when she recently shared her testimony. I have never got to hear her tell it before although, I have followed her blog for years.

http://www.ustream.tv/channel/rivertree-church#/recorded/31460485

This site may refresh so please make sure you click on link for the service from April 14. Also, Rachel begins her testimony at the 40 minute mark of the video.

For those of you who do not watch it, first of all shame on you. J Secondly, I want to leave you with what her testimony left me. It left me with these questions as I search for what pain does God want me to use for His glory.

What is my story?

How should I use it?

I do hope you will watch it. It is a life changer. I know you will be moved by her testimony just like I and some many other connections have among the years.