“I blamed God for all of it. I hated Him.”
For all of us, it’s a challenge to hang onto our faith in God when we don’t see evidence of Him at work in the world. Growing up, Cheyenne knew about God but didn’t understand who He was and how He could help anyone because she didn’t see evidence of Him at work in her life or her family.
When we talked to Cheyenne on the phone this week, she said, “My mom would talk about God, but I never understood when I was young. As I grew older, I tried to follow the God I heard about but was really having a hard time understanding who He really was!”
Then issues within her family totally convinced Cheyenne God was either not real, or H. e didn’t care. She had two brothers she was close to, both of whom abused heroin at different times. One of her brothers used heroin for years, got extremely sick, and then eventually got clean.
Loss followed that victory, however. Cheyenne’s uncle, who she was also close to, died in 2014. A few years later, Cheyenne’s other brother started to use drugs too, including heroin. Then in 2016, her brother committed suicide and died.
That is when Cheyenne “went off the deep end,” as she described. She said, “I blamed God for all of it. I hated Him.” She said, “I just knew there was no God. If there was, He wouldn’t have taken my family members from me!”
Cheyenne followed in her brothers’ footsteps and started to use drugs. She used heroin, and she got to the point where she had to use everyday, all day. She said, “I couldn’t deal with my hurt and my loss. I couldn’t bear it, so the drug was my god!”
Cheyenne was unwilling to change her habits and didn’t see the need to for a long time. “The only way I would be able to get clean is if I die,” she said.
But then she got pregnant, and that inspired her to stop using heroin…for a while. But on the anniversary of her brother’s death she started to use again. She said, “I don’t know what happened. I couldn’t stop the pain I was feeling about my brother, so I started using again.”
Cheyenne’s eyes started to open when even her dealer started to try to get her to quit! She told us, “When I went to my dealer, he said to me, ‘Why are you even here? You don’t belong here, go home and get clean.’” She got clean again a month later and just went through the motions. She knew there had to be a better way…but she had no idea what it was.
Then a friend who went to Crossroads shared a 2 Minute Message with Cheyenne. She started to watch Pastor Daniel and got really curious about the God she’d heard about all her life but never understood. Then something really cool happened! Cheyenne said, “I was up really early with my son, and he had the channel changer. And Pastor Daniel’s show came on, and I heard the tail end of the show where he asks if anyone wants to give their heart to Jesus. I knew that was a sign from God, and I said ‘yes’ that very morning.”
Cheyenne is finally feeling hope and understanding God’s grace and forgiveness for the first time in her life. When we reached out to her this week, she said, “I did not expect anyone to call me, and you did – I know God is really listening!”
Cheyenne is finally feeling hope and understanding God’s grace and forgiveness for the first time in her life. Click To TweetSince she lives not far from Crossroads Community Church in Vancouver, Washington, we invited her to join us at church, and asked her if she wanted to go to Celebrate Recovery. This week, on February 20, Cheyenne joined us for worship at Crossroads for the first time and then attended our Celebrate Recovery group. We are so excited about the transformation God is doing in Cheyenne’s life, and we can’t wait to see where the Lord leads her next.