Between the Lines

It’s never too late to do the right thing

May 25^th, 2022

Chapter 11: BOTH – Second and Fifth Chances

Ephesians 3:20, ‘Never doubt God’s mighty power to work in you and accomplish all this. He will achieve infinitely more than your greatest request, your most unbelievable dream, and exceed your wildest imagination! He will outdo them all, for His miraculous power constantly energizes you.’ (TPT)

‘You ready?’ she hollered, her voice echoed in the empty and spacious room. They had just signed the papers but hadn’t moved anything in yet. Jessie had suggested they take this opportunity to deep clean, to replace the old, trampled carpet from previous tenants and paint the walls, spruce it up. Spring-cleaning, he called it. Shanna giggled, what could Jessie possibly know about spring-cleaning?!

Somewhere, in the large house—a house much larger than Shanna had ever even been in, let alone, had an opportunity to own—a door slammed, followed by the sound of little footsteps. ‘What’s the rule about slamming doors?’ Shanna asked, just as they appeared at the doorway to the kitchen.

‘Shut the door qwietwe,’ a little girl identical to Shanna waggled her finger while her twin brother placed small hands on his hips, and yelped, ‘How many times I have’ta tell ya? Nevah slam dem doors.’ Shan giggled, mimicked by Rorie, and she reached out to tousle Jory’s hair.

‘Where’s your daddy?’ Shanna looked at both their faces and giggled again as they both shrugged little shoulders and shook their heads. Rorie put hands on her hips too and replied with her enormous eyes, ‘He’s not my r’spons’bility ta-day,’ she clamored.

‘Okay, Miss Sass, well, you better make it your responsibility today,’ Shan laughed, swinging her hips side to side in unison with her twins. ‘Cuz we need to leave here in a few minutes and I need your daddy’s help. You go line him out, ya hear. Tell him Mommy needs him. Pronto!’ Shan smiled as they disappeared, both on an important mission they would not fail at. They were a pair to draw to, and the best gifts God could have ever given them, she and Jessie, to restore the years the locust had eaten. Zachary would always remain a piece of her, a thread woven into their tapestry. She’d never, no never, forget one detail—in fact, she would never cease looking for him and praying the Lord would miraculously make their paths cross again—but these children were a product of surrender, obedience, trust, new beginnings. They were a gift directly delivered from the hand of God, His affirmation that He was a faithful God; He gave second and fifth chances; He always kept His Word. Shan sighed; just five minutes peace, she murmured silently, here in this moment, before…before who knew what was going to happen? five minutes peace, to remember, to reflect.

She wasn’t sure how she had made it, why she had survived. She should have been dead. She used to want it bad enough; she had bargained with the devil enough times. She deserved to be dead, truth be told. She’d consumed more drugs, more lethal doses, than drug lords and gang bangers and mules, all the time, trying to kill herself, and she was still here. The depth of that knowledge used to trip her up.

She pulled through the first overdose the day Jessie told her Zachary was gone for good by some miracle, some person who disappeared after getting her help. Much like the unknown person who had stormed through her door and dropped her off at an ER the afternoon Zachary was born. That wasn’t a first and last incident; there were more occasions when Shanna utterly gave up, and an invisible savior brought her through each crisis, every attempt, always. More than three years of attempts and she even failed at killing herself; she couldn’t even get that right!

One day, having just survived another OD, Shanna found herself huddled beneath the bridge, broken and frozen and coming down, in agony that she had made it. She raised her fist angrily at God and accused Him of saving her, and she thought she heard a laugh. For real, He spoke, and she heard it all around and deep within. “I’m trying to, child, if you would just let go and let Me.”

‘Why me?’ She had raged at Him. ‘What do You want from me? It’s like You love me or something; You won’t leave me alone!’

And He answered her; so close was He, she could hear His whisper and the sadness also in His voice. “What in the world do you think I have been trying to tell you, to show you. Come with Me,” He had beckoned, and a woman appeared next to her almost instantaneously, taking her by the arm and pulling all eighty pounds of her to her feet. ‘Come with me,’ the woman had pleaded with her. ‘I have something to show you.’ And Shanna followed, thinking it was a joke but maybe there was a hit to be scored.

‘Mum,’ an insistent voice interrupted Shan’s reverie, tugging on her blouse. ‘We looked ev’rywheres for Daddy, and he’s jus’ lost,’ Rorie boasted. Jory chimed in. ‘This house here is jus’ too big! He done got lost or he don’t never know his way home yet.’ Jory nodded his head in agreement with his little self and Rorie nodded; her palms open as if they were confused too.

‘It’s okay, darlin’s. Why don’t you go sit on the front porch and watch for Daddy to come then? When he gets here, come get me and we’ll go, okay?’ She wiped the residue from a tear off her cheek, thankful she hadn’t begun crying. Five minutes more peace, she promised herself. The timing was perfect.

That woman disappeared too, but not before taking Shan into a shelter, warming her up, feeding her and placing her in the center of about a dozen others just like her. The difference was, they all had a story they loved to tell of how Jesus had rescued them out of miry pits, had dredged them from the bottom of broken bottles and garbage dumps, had placed them right here in this safe place, and had filled them with hope and joy and fervor, to effectuate change in their lives. Day by day, step by step, Shan began to morph. She saw real restoration in others, and then in herself. It wasn’t long before she stopped looking back; she ceased searching for the junk, and she wanted Jesus more than she had ever wanted anything else in her life. And He delivered. He was fully and overwhelmingly present everywhere she went. He surrounded her, enveloped her, gave her hope and love, remade her.

It was too good. Life was too good, and Jesus was too real to keep Him to herself. She had to share Him with someone, and whom other than Jessie deserved to know? She told herself it was only right to help Jessie find some peace. It was fitting to give him something helpful after all the hurt she caused. After all they had been through together, after all they had lost, perhaps if they could both receive something good out of it, something to help others with, it could all then maybe someday be worthwhile.

She looked him up and eventually Shanna located Jessie. It took a few weeks to even get the guts about herself to approach him. But she finally did. A smile played hide-n-seek with her lips as she thought back on the memory. The sweetness of the surprise on his face when he looked up and she was standing before him. She looked good, she knew she did, healthy and happy. He almost fell over. ‘Shan?’ he had asked in puzzlement. ‘Shanna, is that you? My goodness,’ he exclaimed. ‘I almost didn’t recognize you!’ And the rest was history.

‘Shan, where are you?’ Jessie bellowed, as he came bounding through the door. ‘You ready?’ he asked.

‘Hey! that’s my line,’ she answered back, shaking her head that was still filled with memories. ‘Did the kiddos find you? Oh!’ she startled as he waddled toward her with a child wrapped around each leg.

‘We founded him, Mummy,’ they giggled in unison. ‘What should we do wif him now, Mummy?’ they chorused. ‘Where we goin’ anyways?’ they asked.

Jessie’s eyes sparkled, ‘Well, children, we are going to watch a soccer game, and maybe, just maybe! we might meet someone special.’

‘Who?!’ they demanded simultaneously. ‘Jinx!’ they both giggled. It was not difficult to tell they were identical.

‘If I told you, I’d have to kill you,’ Jessie grinned. It was a little game they played.

‘Is it top secret?’ they asked in unison, giggling so hard they barely could stand.

He began chasing them to the door and they squealed in delight. Shanna yelled, ‘You all get loaded up and I’ll be right there after I fix my face.’ Five minutes more peace, she thought again to herself. The memory had almost run out.

Jessie fell in love with Jesus maybe even more than she had. They were in church every time the doors opened. They took it slow. What they had once, they didn’t understand so it was never rekindled. But the Lord gave them a ferocious love for one another eventually. They dated properly, tenaciously and tediously unraveling their past. They counseled with their pastor. They agreed to wait for one another until they both had healed, until the wounds weren’t so raw and bleeding, until they were ready to be obedient to what God expected of them, until they could do it right.

To others, there had never been such a potent and beautiful love story, one the Lord was writing everyday in front of their peers and support team, congregation and mentors. To Jessie and Shanna, no one really had any idea of the cost, the pieces, the shards inside that still cut, the painful catch when they breathed really deep as a little boy approximately Zachary’s age dashed by. No one knew about the shame and how deep it could roll through you, nor could they possibly understand the gratitude and grace Shan especially felt when she realized daily what God had delivered her from and brought her through.

Who could have known, their wedding was the most attended in all the years their pastor had wed couples? There wasn’t seating for better than a quarter of the guests. They ran out of cake and beverages while a line still lingered on the sidewalk, attempting to enter, and mysteriously, an unknown guest arrived with a plethora of bottled water and soda cans and dangerously balancing an entire other wedding cake. Who could have known, they would wed on Zachary’s fifth birthday (it was the number for grace), and the Lord would give them beauty in exchange for ashes and joy for mourning and grace would spring up where hope had once died?

‘I don’t mean to pressure you, babe, but are you coming? We don’t want to miss the game.’ The practical side of Jessie was the track on which Shan traveled. Put them away for another day; the memories that is, she was reminded.

‘Coming!’ she hollered. ‘Be right there.’

Psalm 18:19, ‘He stood me in a wide-open field. I stood there saved; surprised to be loved.’ (MSG)

Between the Lines is based upon a true story. What does God’s faithfulness truly look like? Is it the same in every situation? He is wholly trustworthy; therefore, there is victory, even if it doesn’t resemble everything we imagined.