My Father in Heaven is Perfect

"This is my Father's world,
Oh let me never forget
That though the wrong seems oft so strong,
God is the ruler yet!
This is my Father's world,
Why should my heart be sad?
The Lord is King let the heavens ring!
He reigns, let the earth be glad!"

-Maltbie D. Babcock,

We met at a rehab center while we were both working our way through school. After one casual date, we both confessed to feeling like lukewarm Christians. As we sat out under the stars that summer night, we decided to ask God to guide our individual lives. We prayed that God would inspire us to live for Him with passion. We had no idea how quickly God would answer that prayer.

A month went by--a month in which we barely saw each other because we were just casual friends. Then one day a singing group came to the rehab center where Cherilyn was working in activities. As she was wheeling the residents down to the concert, one of the singers asked if she would be interested in joining another singing tour. She auditioned and was soon making plans to join her team.

Two nights later, Raleigh and his friends went to another concert across town. It was the same group of musicians and he also auditioned. We choose from three different tours at the time and both of us choose "Tour Zed." Soon we were living on a bus, traveling across America for nine months with twelve other people. Our mission trip also included a month in Australia and New Zealand.

The frist thing we did was scrape the table clean of our family's beliefs and we began to study the Bible for ourselves. Verse by verse, we built a deeper understanding of our faith. We discovered that God is a personal God and He works through people of all different denominations. The nine months that we spent with Tour Zed cemented some of our personal beliefs but this was only the beginning of our journey with God.

A couple of years later, as our love and friendship continued to grow even deeper, we decided we wanted to get married. It would be nice to say that we lived happily ever after, but that is just not the case. We had been married for less than a year, when we moved across the country (away from everyone we knew) for Raleigh to attend school. This turned out to be one of the worst years of our marriage.

Still newlyweds, we had a huge fight over a bounced check that escalated into door slamming and yelling. In the middle of our big fight, a local pastor came to give us some groceries and invite us to come to his church. We were embarrassed about our fighting and opened up to him. It was very strange, because he acted like we shouldn't talk about it, then he went on his way without even a prayer. This was one of many experiences where we met pastors who were more concerned with getting new members than sharing the water of life and it was discouraging to us.

As the years went by we began to open up with each other and with God. Cherilyn grew up in a family that was very enmeshed and controlling even to the point of not allowing her a high school education because she might get contaminated by the world. Her teen years had been filled with coercion and beatings, but she had been raised to feel responsible for her siblings and parents. Her attempts to bring her family together often ended in disappointment. As an adult she continued to struggle with her parent's judgmental attitudes whenever she made her own life choices.

While Raleigh was growing up, his grandmother and parents often fought each other for control in the family. Raleigh, looking for an escape, started numbing out with pornography when he was only twelve. This began to affect our marriage. Even though he loved and adored Cherilyn, his struggles with a pornography and intimacy issues, caused many misunderstandings between us. It seemed like there were very few mentors and support for either of us and several years into our marriage, when Cherilyn finally discovered Raleigh's porn stash she decided to slash her wrists. The moment she went to the kitchen to get a knife, the phone rang and God intervened.

The stress of our pain and insecurities created a tension between our anger and love that often escalated into violence. All those secrets that we had kept to please our parents or hide our scars were either going to kill us or come out of the walls. If only those walls could speak, they would have said that two broken people that had no idea what love looked like were crying out for help. But Jesus was never far away.

One day we were visiting a county fair booth about domestic violence when we realized that we were both children of violence. Even though we hated the past, we were actually acting out the roles our families had provided for us. When a child sees a parent break a plate or slam a door or feels the belt beating them over and over in anger, they absorbed that behavior and become like their abuser. With two paper plates that day, we traced our hands and wrote "These hands will never be used for violence." That was over ten years ago and we have both continued to kept that promise.

We share these stories because we now know that we are only as sick as our secrets. The devil wants Christians to hide their secrets behind a self-righteous cloak. He knows that bringing everything out into the light of God's love, promotes our healing.

The wonder of God's love is that He loved us first before we even deserved His love! 

Then He continued to love us and heal us from the wounds of our sin as we became willing to let Him.

Then, even as we failed again, He continued to love us and pick up the pieces of our broken lives despite our mistakes.

Mind control--whether it comes from parents, the church or Satan's lies--it is always a deadly thing. Jesus is the Truth and through His example we now know that God never forces or coerces anyone to do His will.

Allowing God to re-parent us has been the source of our healing. Just as every healthy parent eventually lets go of control and becomes friends with their adult child, God wants His children to grow up and make their choices based on the proof of His Word-- Jesus Christ. Through Jesus, God wants to befriend us. Jesus put it this way:

"No longer do I call you servants...but I have called you friends." John 15:15

Servants are worried about legalistic and external details, but friends have a united purpose and understanding with God. Serving God because we understand His love is much more rewarding than obeying Him out of fear and obligation.

We have now been married for almost 20 years. The darkness has finally been obliterated by the light of who Jesus is and He has given us a peace-filled life.

No matter where you have been, or what you have done, it is our prayer that when you read our blogs and stories that you will find hope in Jesus and begin to realize the truth that

"The Father Himself loves you." John 16:27

Being restored by His grace,

Raleigh and Cherilyn Clough