Yesterday was a whirlwind in many ways.  Because I got to work and hadn’t been there for almost two weeks, I had much to get caught up in readiness for my departure from them next Wednesday.  I quickly left in the afternoon to get to my grandson’s basketball game before going to the Aslan board meeting last night.

As I got to the meeting about 7 minutes ahead of its start, I saw that the chaplain at the juvenile correction center was there.  She is the one who had asked me to give my testimony for the kids last fall and also to have our quartet sing for them at their Christmas event.  She informed me that she had quit as of Dec. 31, 2016.  The day after our quartet sang she was called into the director’s office.  The director had received 3 emails complaining about my testimony and using the word “gay”.  The complaints had come from the adults present who supervise the kids.  No kid had complained at all.   I was called bigoted, etc. She had informed the director that this was just a fact of my story and that the conclusion of my testimony was one of redemption.  None of this mattered.  There is much history to this that doesn’t connect to me.  The director was wanting to remove the spiritual influence from the center and this was being used as another solid example of why it needed to happen.  The chaplain said she was relieved and glad to be gone.  This morning I have so many mixed emotions but I am assured that there is nothing I should have done or said differently.  I leave it with God.  It does hit me however, just how powerful Satan’s influence is when we are listening to the flesh and not the Spirit as we do our daily work.

God is amazing!  I’m sure glad God has more clearly opened my eyes to living in the new creation He has given me.  If I’d heard last night’s message in the old self, I would have run to my cave knowing I’d not listened to God and how in the world did I get this gal fired?  What damage had I done for some of these poor kids?  Instead, even though I’m sorry for this news, I know that all of this fits into a much bigger picture.  These teens in this center are examples of kids abused and beat up by society and they have taken their own steps of rebellion and retaliation getting them now placed in the center.  All of this pleases Satan to no end.  Removing the message of HOPE from the environment of the center only allows him to manipulate more.  God is bigger and more powerful than all of this.  I will rest assured that He is certainly not done working with each of these kids and even the adults that complained.  I leave this in God Almighty’s hands.