A Testimony Behind this Website by JuliaPosted May 2001
This website has been a long time in coming. Several years ago when the internet was fairly new and I was a pastor's wife in a small town in Tennessee, I became very caught up in the whole thing. You know--had to e-mail back and forth with my friends. Had to check out all the sites and find out all about what was on the new fangled World Wide Web!
I was disheartened that there were basically no sites geared for pastor's wives or Christian ladies for that matter. I hated and still hate going into Christian bookstores and there are books for all types of ministries--pastorate, teen, singles, children's--you name it. Help for this. Help for that. But none or very few resources for the ladies who run the women's ministry in local churches. I wanted to start my own website and make it a place for pastor's wives and women's ministry workers. There were very few Christian ladies pages at the time. Peggy's Place was about all there was to offer. Even that was just a few pages at the time. What little was geared for Christian ladies was hard to find because the search engines were not as they are today. I decided I was going to make the "dream" site for women's resources but God had other things in store for me and my family.
During that time I was very into my life. My oldest daughter was in grade school and I was very involved in her school with the Parent Teacher Organization, very invovled in our community serving on a couple county boards for Foster Care and Truency, and also very caught up into being a pastor's wife and mother and building up a ladies ministry in our church and everything else that goes along with it. I wrote a lot. I wrote several ladies devotionals and had even started writing several chapters on a book I wanted to write on Ladies Ministry. I was a BUSY woman! I can remember our neighbors teasing me about how many times I pulled in and out of our driveway a day!
All this while my husband and I thought that we would never have any more children. We had one daughter at the time. We had tried for several years and I just KNEW that my life was set and I would be going through it with one child and was happy. Of course if you have ever went through infertility you always keep that longing especially when you see new mothers and babies around. That's when it pulls at your heartstrings or when someone wants you and your husband to just start popping out more kids and breaks down your spirit by the things they say.
I went happily go lucky along my way and then we had some changes in my family's life. My husband resigned his position with the church and we made preparations to move three hours from where we were. All of a sudden I became very sick. I thought it was from all the stress, preparing to move, having to leave friends behind whom I'd grown to love. Just the thought of that move made me shudder. Wow! When I see a Rider or U-haul truck along the road I automatically send up a prayer for that family! Moving is stressful and I had done it too many times in my life.
Life went along and I kept getting sicker and sicker and thought I was developing an ulcer or something. My husband kept telling me maybe I was pregnant and we'd have a good laugh. Finally I got a home pregnancy test. It was one of those plus and minus things and I kept looking at it thinking WOW! NO! IT'S DEFECTIVE! LET'S TAKE ANOTHER ONE!! I kept that first test in the bathroom window seal for days. I just kept looking at the results over and over and over. But it wasn't defective. I at the age of almost 36 was going to have a baby!
We moved and got settled. I didn't get sick physically as much as with my first child but I was sick mentally and spiritually. I just couldn't quite adjust to the prospect of having a child. I felt I wasn't ready. All this time I'd wanted more children and even prayed for it--why did God have to answer my prayer now?? Couldn't He have done it several years earlier? I felt like a kid that asked for a new toy when they were 5 and got it when they were a teenager. It just didn't seem to fit! What would I do with a baby in my life? I knew it was a blessing from God-a precious little life coming along. But why was I going to be the mother? I was so set in my ways. I was becoming one of those people--you know the ones who can't stand children to be on airplanes or in restaurants. I enjoyed babies and children at the church but then they'd go home with their parents. My house was quiet. My first daughter was going into the sixth grade. I was past all that other stuff.
When my husband gave his resignation to our church we had only found out the Saturday a week before that I was pregnant. It was such a tough decision to make to leave the church to begin with. We'd both wanted more children and my husband felt like this was another way God was giving His blessing on what we were doing at the time. I however was saying why, why, why?
During that pregnancy I went into a deep depression. I'd go to church on Sundays and Wednesdays, come home and just go back into my depression. That whole time is just a blur to me now. I'd cry all day long--not just a little here or there, I'd cry literally most of the day. My husband cooked, did the chores, and took care of me. I couldn't hardly function. I'd go to church and doctor's appointments, but coming from such a busy life, I was really not myself. I didn't even e-mail or use the computer anymore. Nothing. Just alienated myself from everybody.
I kept looking at myself like it was someone's life besides my own. I wasn't supposed to get so far from enjoying God's blessings. I was the preacher's kid, accepted Christ when I was only nine, had been in BMA (Bible Memory Association) from the time I was little until I was an adult. I knew hundreds of Bible verses. Was always invovled in some type of ministry and went to a Christian college. I was the one who did all the ladies speaking, was the one other people came to for council. I should have been able to take anything, trust God and move on. I always had! Why couldn't I get it together?
Life went along. Slowly and I mean SLOWLY God was working through me to show me that this was what He had intended. Not what I had written conveniently on my schedule. Oh, let's mark in having a baby here! It didn't work like that and God was showing me He was still in control. Still my Maker and my Guide through things big and small. About three months before our second daughter was born my parents came and visited. My father suffered a heart attack during the visit. Just another thing to show me that life was precious and God was the one in charge.
I reflected a lot on the verse "Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?" (Matt. 6:26) God hadn't deserted me. He cares for even the sparrows. Through much prayer, love, and support and through God's love and grace I finally snapped out of my depression. When our second child was born I can say I was happy. God had given me a special gift. A life to help mold and train up for His glory. And indeed our daughter is precious.
And just to make me know that God was truly in control of my life and not me, I was just learning what new motherhood was about all over again when I found out I was pregnant once more. This time I didn't get depressed. I KNEW that God was the One who put the heavens into place and watched over the birds of the air. Surely He knew what He was doing. It was His decision for me to bear another precious life. Our son came around fifteen months after our second daughter.
Just call my husband and I, "Abraham" and "Sarah". We have been blessed. Although getting down on the floor with your kids is much harder as I near forty! How did Abraham and Sarah do it?
My quiet orderly house is no longer orderly or quiet. It's cluttered with toys, messes, hugs, kisses, and small children's cries and laughter. I don't want an orderly house any more and I don't even remember what a quiet house is like.
My youngest children are now three and almost two and now they play together well and give me time to get on the computer and work once again. I am almost finished with that book I started years ago and now I have the time to start that ladies site I've always wanted to. It was so refreshing to see that other sites have popped up and that the internet isn't such a barren place for Christians anymore. My desire to put together a site on the web to encourage pastor's wives and women's ministry workers might be a long time in coming but it was worth the wait. God knew it was His timing and not mine.
Some may happen by and just think that I'm just another ditzy woman that had to name their website by a "cutesy" name like--Julia's Home Tweet Home-- but I will know that it reminds me that God watches "even the sparrows" and surely He can take care of me.
This testimony article may not be reproduced in any manner without written permission.
Copyright©2001 Julia Bettencourt
Scripture References are from the King James Version.Please Note: All parts to "Julia's Home Tweet Home" are now under the name of "Creative Ladies Ministry", but you will still find Julia's Nest here.
If you need help dealing with infertility or infant death, visit the following...
Hannah's Prayer Ministries