Friday, July 25, 2008

God's Plan (VI)

3:27 PM by Christi Bowman

I stopped telling my story yesterday at the point God drove me to my room, alone. I was all by myself. I was writing, reading, praying and crying. I had so much going on in my head. My head hurt from all of the emotion. I was practicing listening prayer. I was lying on my bed, waiting for God to speak into this. He did. He told me to call my brother. It was good direction. What I was about to tell my parents would, of course, affect him.

Whether my parents believed me or not, my brother was going to hear about the conversation. Whatever they would say had possibilities of opening up a lot of wounds for him as well. God wanted him to know he had somewhere to turn. A few years earlier I had tried to have this conversation with him. At that time I still did not have a very clear picture, but I knew something had happened to us at our caretakers house. I told him then because my brother has always had a rough time. He started using drugs and alcohol around twelve. He has always been much more destructive than me. He has been in several accidents, car and otherwise that have almost cost him his life. He has been in jail on several occasions. He has been through rehab three different times. At the time I first started this conversation with him, years earlier, he was in an abusive relationship with his girlfriend. He was becoming abusive. She had called the cops on him a few nights previous because he was scaring her. He had caused damage to her property so they took him to jail. Because of problems in my own life I was pretty sure I knew where his issues were coming from. I wanted to let him know what I was beginning to uncover. I wanted to see his reaction. I wanted to see if this connected with him at all. I saw him allow it to resonate for a little while, but his girlfriend was with us, and she made a comment, and he let his anger spew out all over the coffee bar we were at...so much so that we had to leave. That moment, for him, was gone. He had made that choice. As I left Nashville, I asked him to think about it. He never brought it back up.

Fast forward a couple years down the road. I am lying on my bed, being told by God that I need to let him know what I am about to do. Everything is a lot clearer now, and I am about to confront our parents. I find his name in my contact list, hover over it for a few moments, and push the call button. My heart is racing once again. He answers the phone..."hello?"

I say "hi", but I don't have time for small talk. I cut to the chase..."I have something to talk to you about" I tell him. He says o.k. I start to sob. I can't remember the last time I cried that hard. I was shaking...big shakes...convulsing maybe. I hurt so bad. He could tell. He says "I am sorry doll" in the sweetest most comforting voice that I have ever heard come out of his mouth. I tell him everything. I tell him what I have gone through. What God has done for me. I tell him a much clearer version of what I started to tell him years ago...complete with details...details I knew he would remember. He did. He said "so this is what I have buried" I say "what, you know you have buried something?" As if he is somehow farther along then I am in this process. He tells me he as been through enough rehab and counseling to know that something bad has happened to him, but he has buried it for so long he doesn't know if he has the ability or the strength to find it. He tells me he is the master of hiding it. He knows who he is on the inside. He knows what he is capable of. He works 24 hours 7 days a week just to keep himself out of trouble. He wants drugs so bad he can taste them, but he white knuckles it by working himself to death just to keep his hands busy. He is so angry on the inside, but he is tired of hurting the people he loves with his actions and his mouth. He has a death wish and rides a motorcycle 150mph just hoping to die. He is numb.

It is no surprise to me that he feels this way, but I am surprised by his eloquence. He gets himself quite well. He is tired of who he is. He is scared of that person. He fights himself everyday, he tortures himself, it seems, to act right. He is tired of fighting. When he asks me how I discovered all this...how I remembered, I told him God, first, had to take away the alcohol. I told my brother that these were my memories, and that he, no doubt, has some of his own, but he would have to find them. He has been addicted since he was 12 years old, and for the first time in his life he has a reason to quit.

I praise God for that.

More tomorrow.

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