Have you ever experienced a season of life that you feel embarrassed and ashamed to talk about? Well, I have. In fact, I lived in that season for three and a half years of my life. To this day, I've never spoken to my childhood friends and family about this. There are only a handful of close friends who know about the season of my life where I experienced homelessness with my husband.
The Struggle Was Real
For three and a half years, my husband and I were homeless, living out of our car. This challenging season began in 2012, and to this day, it remains the most traumatic, degrading, and embarrassing season of my life. It was a time of profound financial hardship, triggered by unemployment and the struggle to find meaningful employment. While many people experienced financial hardship during the recession of 2008, what led us into our season went way deeper than having a hard time finding jobs. We had no mental health challenges, addictions, or bad habits that would have contributed to us becoming homeless. In fact, we were diligently seeking a closer relationship with God through daily devotion, Bible study, and prayer. We were serving diligently in our church, and thought we were doing everything right by the world’s standards. However, little did we know that God had a plan for us to draw closer to Him by stripping us of everything we knew.
The Unexpected Journey
It's difficult to grasp, but what if I told you that our season of homelessness was orchestrated by God Himself. Would you believe me? Maybe not, but what I am about to tell you is true. Before we became homeless, God started to prepare us for a spiritual journey that was designed to mold us into the people He called us to be. I confess that we did everything in our power to hold on to everything we had. I mean, wouldn’t you? It’s in our nature to seek comfort at every moment in our lives. Over time, we came to realize that we were fighting a losing battle against God. He wanted this for us. Eventually we lost everything. We lost our home, we lost our possessions, and were only able to keep what we could fit in a two-seater sports car (that didn't even belong to us). Heartbroken, we forged ahead and decided to completely submit to what we knew was the will of God.
The Long, Narrow Road Ahead
Leaving behind friends and family, we chose to keep our situation hidden, mainly due to embarrassment. I couldn't bring myself to share the truth with my close circle. To this day I've never said it out loud to anyone in my family that I was homeless. Growing up, I had to overcome a lot of adversity just to attend and graduate from college. I came from a single parent household where my mother struggled with addiction and spent time incarcerated throughout my middle and high school years. I worked hard to be among the first in my family to graduate from college. After graduating college, I aspired to start a career, get married, and start a family the right way. You know, live a life that would make my family proud of me. I was well on my way. I moved to Virginia and got married to the man of my dreams in a literal Dream Wedding that we won! Little did we know, winning that wedding would spark a faith movement that would ultimately land us in a place where we were living out of our car. Wow.
The Purpose of It All
People often asked us about the purpose of our trials. Some insisted that we didn't have to suffer or lose everything to follow God. While that may be true for some, our experience was unique to us for God’s purpose and plan. Our hardships were ordained by God for His glory. What sets our story apart is the duration of our season of trials. Before we became homeless, God had been prompting us to study the book of Revelation, specifically chapters 11 and 12, which speak of a wilderness season lasting 1,260 days. “And I will appoint my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.”- Revelation 11:3 (NIV). “The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days.” Revelation 12:6 (NIV). At that time, we didn’t fully understand what that scripture meant for us, but we couldn’t let it go.
Divine Confirmation
In January 2012 we were evicted from an apartment we were blessed to rent. Not knowing what to do or where to go, we went back to my husband’s parent’s home in Columbia, SC. Shortly after arriving in Columbia, God just really pressed on my husband, and he ultimately made the decision for us to return back to Virginia. I struggled with this because we didn’t have a home there, so what are we going back to? So, we returned back to Virginia with no place to live. We had enough money for a hotel room but after that money ran out it was just the two of us and a bag of clothes and our two-seater sports car. We didn't know what to do, so we went to a church. At the service the pastor was teaching from Revelation 11. It felt like a dream because it's rare to hear teaching from the book of Revelation. We accepted that as Divine confirmation that we made the right decision. God wanted us in Virginia, but we still weren’t sure why. We spent the following three and a half years going from place to place, living out of our car, sharing our testimony with churches, and learning how God provides in mysterious ways.
A Time of Spiritual Awakening
Despite the emotional and physical toll of our season of homelessness, it was a spiritually pure time. We trusted God, and He provided for our basic needs. We never had to resort to ungodly means for provisions. We had to humble ourselves and ask for help, and many individuals and churches stepped up. Every day was spent in prayer and studying the Bible. We diligently sought God's guidance for our next steps. During this season, God revealed His call to ministry in our lives. He gave us a vision for how we can carry out our ministry work through T.R.I.N.I.T.Y. (our non-profit organization), and our LLC, Igniting You. Our mission is now to share our life's story, with all its twists and "beauty for ashes," to bless the body of Christ, particularly churches in need of revival.
Breaking the Chains of Shame
Satan tried to silence my testimony, knowing its power to bring people to Christ. I declare today that I am no longer bound by the shame and guilt of our season of homelessness. We've found a life of abundance, not in material wealth or fame, but in an intimate relationship with God that we would have never experienced without our wilderness season. I encourage every reader to embrace the tests of life as opportunities to build a testimony that will bring others to life and strengthen the Kingdom of God. John 10:10 states, "The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full (NIV)." Our story is a testament to the power of faith and the boundless love and grace of God. I pray that my story inspires you to break free from the chains of shame and embrace the journey that awaits when you trust in God's plan.
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