As we sit together here at my table, the wood stove is blazing in the living room to keep us warm, and the sun is out today after a few days of rain, snow and clouds…

That was her ideal.. and she was living it.

But she has had to learn to surrender certain ideals, and then discover a new kind of beauty that God would have for her.

This precious soul knows heartache, trauma and tragedy...and she KNOWS where her strength comes from. She resonates with my restorable project because she has had her eyes and heart wide open to see what being restored can look like and feel like.  

Like most of us, she lives a full life wearing many hats. Her titles run from wife, mom, adoptive mom, friend, daughter, speaker, author… and then some other less shiny titles… like, widow, “shooter’s wife” and the wife of the Amish schoolhouse shooting.

God?... He calls her, “his own”, “beloved”, “daughter”...

And today… we will call her by her name.. “Marie Monville”!

Alright, Marie, what do you think… did I introduce you accurately?

Well, before we move on today, I want people to know that your not all brokenness and redemption … there is more to you than that. So, would you please share with us a few things that you're into right now, maybe some hobbies, or maybe a little “day in the life” sort of preview.

Marie - I have six kids, five at home, so I would say that most of the time, my hobbies would be... well, I would try to say that I do something really exciting outside of being a wife and a mom, but I think most of my time is invested in my kids, and I love that. I love them, and I love the relationship that we’ve had and continue to walk out, as some of them are transitioning into adults. But, in those rare moments when I have some quiet time on my own, I love to write, to sit at my piano, and occasionally I still like to bake. I LOVED to bake when I was younger, and sometimes my kids remember the things that I haven’t made in a really long time. And then I ask them, well, lets do them together! Let me teach you how to bake it, and you can do the dishes!!  

It seems like free time happens less and less in this stage of life...but I think I enjoy life more and more, or I relish it for what it is. I know that God is the author of my day. So, I really try to just roll with it, whatever it looks like. Certainly there are days when I plan all kinds of fun things that maybe don’t quite work out, but I know that He is the author of that too.  

I love being a wife and a mom, and the things that He has allowed me to do. I love speaking and writing and being able to give hope to people, and that is probably more of a hobby than anything else. Just the opportunity to care for people, whether in my home or maybe it’s someone I just meant.

Jen - You just mentioned the word “control” and it reminded me of something you said on the phone to me. So, Marie quoted a movie that she watched…

Marie - yes, so, I would love to think that I am in control, I know that I am not in control. My mom used to say that I would have my ducks alphabetized, height wise, and color coded...my husband knows that I want all the details. So a few years ago we were watching “Kung Fu Panda”, and they were talking about “the illusion of control”. And I thought, that is exactly what it is. All of my trying to be in control is just an illusion. I am not really in control of anything, except the way I respond to my life. So, I have tried to lay down a bit of my “illusion of control” and roll with it. I am definitely much better at it in this season then maybe 10 or 20 years ago. It’s hard.

How about a “day in the life” of Marie back 13 years ago, those couple of months before your life changed...what was your normal day like. You were “that car” driving down the road, doing life as usual…

Back then, I was a stay at home wife and mom. We had three kids.  Abigail was 7, Brice was 5, and Carson was 18 months. I was very much enmeshed in the mom with young kids routine. Two of them went to school, 2nd grade and kindergarten...so, library books and show-and-tell...and all those things that we forget! But, ya know, just being that real “hands on” mom. I played the piano some back then, and I would have said that “I loved to bake”.  

I lived next door to my grandparents at that time, and my parents lived down the street, so I probably would have taken something that I baked to them...you know, just that normal Lancaster County, idealic lifestyle.

So, you were just a normal doting wife and mom, right? You were doing this life... and I gathered, from reading your book, that it was morning and you were doing the normal thing of sending kids off to school and husband off to work.

Yes, we walked the kids to the bus that morning. Charlie kissed the kids and said, “I love you”, and then he had some things to do for work. I led a prayer group for our elementary school, so Carson and I went off to do that.

It was one of those Indian summer kinds of days… the kind where the calendar says “October” but it felt like summer. The windows were open, the breeze was warm. You could hear the sound of harvesting around, as you would picture Lancaster County at that time of year.

Isn’t it amazing how we remember interesting details when looking back to hard days. Like 9-11... I was sitting in my blue rocking chair, nursing my first born.
You remember the weather, the windows being open.

 So, would you please share from your heart, your experience where that “tractor trailer” came across the line and hit you...and there you were on the side of the road…

I think I remember the weather because it was such a stark contrast. The morning started so calm and so beautiful, and nothing eluded to what was coming. I think that that day, my surroundings were the complete opposite of the way I ended up feeling inside. It’s probably, in part, why I remembered it so clearly.  

So, it was just before lunch time and I was expecting Charley to be home soon, but instead, he called me, and said, “Marie, I’m not coming home.”. I could tell by the sound of his voice that he meant it. His voice was flat and cold and lifeless. I never heard his voice sound like that before. On one hand I was trying to hear the things he was saying, things that weren’t making any sense. On the other hand, I am having a moment where my life is flashing before my eyes, and I’m thinking “how can this be? What does this mean?”... and all of those things were going on simultaneously.

Was it surreal?

It was very surreal, and I said to him many times, “please don’t do whatever it is that you are thinking of doing. There has to be another way, there is always another way”.   

At the time, I was not thinking that he was going to hurt anyone else, much less children. I was concerned that he was going to harm himself, but what he was saying wasn’t making any sense. So, at the end of the conversation he just said, “please tell my family that I love them, I left a note for you on the dresser”...and then, he hung up.

So, I went to read the note. He was not a writer. He hated writing out my birthday card every year, that just wasn’t his specialty. But, he left me this multiple page letter on my dresser. It didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but I could tell that there was brokenness inside of him.

I was concerned that he had planned to harm himself. I thought that maybe if I would call 911, then maybe something that didn’t make sense to me, would make sense to someone who was trained for this, and maybe they could help me prevent whatever it was that he was going to do. I started talking to the dispatcher and told him my name, where I lived and the particulars of why I was calling. I told him about Charley’s letter and I could tell that he knew something that I didn’t know.. and he wasn’t telling me anything.  

Did you feel at that moment like maybe you were over-reacting, or were you like, ”I know...this is serious”.

I think part of it is my nature, to see a problem and know that I need to do something about it. I think that is part of who I am, but I very much felt like, he is serious and something is going to happen. If there was anything I could do to stop it, I wanted to do that, at all costs. I have never called 911 in my life, but that was my first thought. I didn’t want to ever look back on this and think, “what if I had done something to prevent this”. It is amazing how fast the mind works.  

The dispatcher just wasn’t telling me anything, and I could tell by the sound of his voice and the questions he was asking, that there was more to this. So, he just told me to stay at home and keep the phone on in case they needed to contact me...then, he hung up.

So, I went outside, and could hear the sound of police cars racing up the street. and helicopters flying overhead. It’s the kind of thing that you want to convince yourself that it doesn’t go together...you want to convince yourself that it is not part of your reality. Though, I knew in the pit of my stomach that it all had to be the same event. 

As I am standing there on my porch, I’m thinking, “God, I just want to pray a prayer that matters, I want to say something that would make a difference”...but I had nothing. There was nothing inside of me. I knew that I was going to be a widow that day. I knew that Charlie wasn’t coming home. I had no idea what it was going to look like, but I knew that that was it for him...and for me, and for this life that we had built. And I am feeling the weight and the emptiness of that, and all I could say was, “God, help.”. In the moment that I said that, I knew that was all I needed to say. It wasn’t about me saying some kind of prayer that mattered. It was simply about the fact that God was already there. God was wherever Charlie was, and He was right there with me. And while all these details were a surprise to me, they were not a surprise to God. He saw this coming, He was there, and I could trust Him. I look back over the landscape of my life, to places in my past where I learned to trust God. It’s not like I grew up with this nature of always trusting the Lord. I could look back to when I lost my first child and had to wrestle through the barrenness of that, and saying face to face to God, “God I don’t trust You. I remember that season of life. I remember the discouragement of thinking how I had been in church all my life, accepted You as my Savior when I was 5, and now stand here as an adult and say, “God, I don’t trust You, I don’t trust this”. And, now seeing how God led me through that loss and taught my heart to trust Him, even with circumstances out of my control, that were not what I wanted. I knew that in the same way that He had met me then, He was meeting me now. The God who had walked me through all of that, was going to walk me through this now, whatever it was.  

There were so many things going on inside of me at the same time; the knowing that Charlie was serious, that He was not planning on coming home. Knowing that the dispatcher knew more than I did, which made me feel worse about whatever was going on. The knowing that there was police cars and helicopters flying overhead, and that all of that had to be related. And then, knowing that I could CHOOSE to trust God in that moment. 

You were probably desperate too, right?

Yes, and I always say, when I share my story, that it’s not like I was some “giant of faith”. It’s not like I was like, “yeah, God..bring it on!”... It’s that I was desperate...that is entirely it. I knew I had nothing, but I knew that I could trust the Lord. 

Do you ever feel like, “don’t misunderstand, don’t give me glory for being some strong chick, cause I'm NOT!!”

Marie - 

Yes, because if you would have said to me on October 1st, “Marie, some really terrible things are gonna happen in your life, and all of what you thought was true or reality, is gonna be gone.” I would have said, “Pick someone else. You’ve got the wrong girl. I’m not strong like that. I can’t survive that. There is no way.” I would not have thought that any of that would be capable of surviving.

I talked to the police for awhile, and they suggested that I pack up whatever I think I might need for a week, and be prepared to leave your home. I knew the media was coming, and I didn’t know where to go, except that my parents lived down the street, and I knew it was better than here.  

The detective left, and they left an officer behind until I was ready to leave. I was carrying things out from bedrooms to the living room, and thinking what am I gonna need for a week. My youngest was napping and my older two were still at school, and as I walked through the living room, I felt like God was asking me to make a choice of what I believed my life to be. I knew I had two choices...I could CHOOSE to believe that my life was over and we were going down like the fastest sinking ship…. OR… I could CHOOSE to believe that God is everything that He says He is. He is everything that I have ever read in the pages of His Word. He is everything I have ever heard someone testify that He is to be. He is everything that He had ever spoken to my heart, and that somehow He would come to rescue us.

I know that those circumstances in our lives that look so hard to us, God doesn’t see them that way. It’s all the same to Him, nothing is harder than something else. He is faithful. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. That is true. It is not just some cliche’...it is true. God is the same today, that He was when He wrote the Bible...He is the same when He orchestrated the events and He is orchestrating our lives. 

I saw how He taught my heart to trust Him. He blessed me with other children, and I knew that in all of those circumstances, that if He could do that, then He could handle this. I knew that I didn't have to be the one that was responsible to figure it all out, I could simply trust Him. I think that choice changed everything ...It was TOTALLY God that He asked me to do that. I mean, when in the midst of the craziness of our lives do we stop and think, “I need to make a choice about what I’m going to believe”. I mean, most of the time that just happens along the way. We make our belief as life is unfolding. But, God stopped me from going to that place, where I would make a belief about my life that was wrong based on the circumstances. By saying, “Marie, before you get too far into this, I want you to choose what your going to believe, because that choice is going to set your course. That is going to be where you go. I totally believe that what we are looking for is what we are going to find. And if I chose to believe that day that life was over, I don’t think that God would have changed the things He has done in my life...I just don’t think I would have seen them. I wouldn’t have been able to see them, because I would have already written it off, that life was over.  

Again, it’s not like I have made all the right choices, or that I am an amazing person of faith. It’s just that God had been faithful and I could trust Him.

Something that I am hearing is, “protection”. And it’s kind of an oxymoron...like, absolute horrific devastation in your home, in your heart, in your children’s lives...AND..IN THE VERY SAME BREATH.. A crazy supernatural protection is happening.

Yes, it is one of those days that I can look at and know that it is undoubtedly one of the most difficult days of my life… BUT ALSO… one of the days that I have seen God so clearly. I felt the strength that God gave me to walk through those circumstances. The ability to make a choice about my life. The way that He shielded me from so many other thoughts, emotions, feelings and conversations. I saw Him in a way that day that I hadn’t seen Him, or maybe hadn’t known to look for Him in my life up to that point.

That is incredible. God is incredible!! 

I sometimes wonder if it is because of the absolute utter weakness in those situations where we are so destitute that it is that supernatural strength that we see. You were able to choose trust.  

But what about the lesser things. What about the smaller moments in life when it is a legitimately hard day, but it is not absolute desperate day. Do you sometimes find that your like, “oh! Right! I forgot, I’m supposed to be trusting You, God”?

Yeah, I think when we have those big moments when we know that we have something much bigger than us, it’s easier to say to God, “hey, I need You, I can’t do this on my own”, because we know that it is bigger than we are. But, I think (from my experience) that those days when life is sort of chipping at us ..that those days are sometimes the more dangerous ones. Because those are the days when we think we can handle it, or we have had so many of them in a row that we are close to giving up. Instead of saying, “God I can’t do this, I need You to do this, I need Your strength, this is way bigger than me, and we kind of feel like we ought to be able to handle them because they are not those great moments of devastation. They are just all those minor moments of frustration or stress, that are actually so dangerous because they pile up in such a way that we end up with these conversations with ourselves like, “maybe I’m just done, I can’t do this anymore”. We all have those thoughts, but those are the moments where we really need to say, “God, I can’t do this. I need You. Can You show me another way?”. I don’t think that He is not showing us in those moments, rather, I think that we are just not looking for it.

I have learned so much about the love of God from being a parent. There are a million times when my kids are going through something and they are not telling me about it, or asking for my help, or sharing their struggle with me. They feel like they ought to be able to handle it, especially as a young adult. But if they just would have allowed me to shoulder that with them. I think it’s sort of the same way with our relationship with the Lord. We get into these places, and think, “well this isn’t really that big of a deal, I ought to be able to do this!” Yet, those are the places we absolutely need God. It is not necessarily our first thought to reach for Him...because we are trying to do it on our own. And, not from a bad place, right? I mean, it is from a place of responsibility, being an adult, forgetfulness… It comes from a good and understandable place. But, those are the places where we have to reach for the Lord, because those are the things that happen all the time. By allowing Him to be part of the everyday with us, we are building that relationship, that place of trust, so that on our really big days we can reach out with the knowing that God has met me in all these other little places and worked out these things that were no less of a miracle for me. He can totally do this.

So, I am guessing that you are someone who would say, “I’m not here to say that my hard is harder than your hard”.

Your totally right. Whenever someone comes up to me and says, “hey, I’ve not been what you have been through”. I always stop them right there and say, “pain is not a competition. Pain is pain. I know pain and you know pain and that unites us. And it hurts”. We all know pain, and we all know brokenness. Our circumstances are different but we all know those same things inside.  

I don’t look at my difficult things that I am going through today and think, “Marie, you ought to be able to handle this because look at what else you have been through”. It’s not like that, and I’m never thinking that when someone else is sharing with me. Everybody’s journey of brokenness matters.

 So, when others come to you, and they go on and they share that hard thing with you,... have you ever heard in others, or had moments inside of yourself where you just didn’t feel hope. Have thoughts run through either of your minds like, “this isn’t actually restorable, this might be too far gone”.     

I think I always feel hope. I think that this is something that I have believed my whole life. I don’t know if this is something that I knew that I believed until everything that happened to me in 2006. I believe in the faithfulness of God, and I always believe that there is a “work-around”. I don’t call it a solution, but I’d say there is always a “work-around”, a way around, and God is going to help you to find it, if you just keep asking Him.  

I think that would be the bottom line. Whenever someone is coming to me, and saying, “what do I do now?”. It is understandable in those moments that they might not feel hope, but I see the way that God has restored my life. I see all the broken pieces that He picked up and put back together in such an incredibly beautiful way, and I know that if He did it for me, then that is His heart for everybody. 

To me, there is always away around, always a way through. God has got something, it is just allowing Him to show us what it is. Undoubtedly, whenever we are going through a hard time, we kind of have our own perceived solution. We think, here is how I’m gonna work this, or fix this or go through this. Most of the time it is not going to go the way we think. I always say that I’m a good “Hallmark” girl. I love a good story that you can kind of predict in the first five minutes how it’s going to roll. Happy ending, 2 hours or less with commercials. Life typically does not go that way. But, even in the midst of nothing is working out the way I thought, this is not what I thought life was supposed to be…. God, I can trust You. I know that You are going to help me through this. I know that You already see a way around this, or through this. I just have to let You lead me. 

It’s interesting, your conversation has a bit of a theme to it. I am hearing a lot of “work around”, and when Charlie called, you were saying to Him, “There has got to be another way”. … but, little did you know, that God was whispering to YOU, “there is another way”. It was not a message for Charlie, it was a message for Marie. So, that “work around” was a choice that was made in your living room. You were like, “I’m gonna trust You, AND this will be hard.'' 

So, what was the “work around”…the…I don’t even want to say “plan b”, cause I don’t think that’s right…

I don’t think that God is asking us to make all the right choices. I think we put all this pressure on ourselves to get it right. Even in those moments when I was feeling the weight of being a single mom…. Every choice that I made in regards to my kids carried an even more significant weight than it ever did. Even before that… I loved being a mom and I wanted to be the best mom that I could ever be. We had lost two children before I had Abigail, and I think, part of that was coming from that place of loss. I just wanted to be the best mom that I could. So, even in those moments, I felt the weight like…”ok, God, this all matters, it is all significant”… but, I don’t think God wants us to feel that. 

The work around…the way around is not resting on our shoulders. I remember another conversation I had that day with the Lord, I knew that I was going to have to tell my kids what had happened. I knew that I was going to have to tell them that they didn’t have a father, and it wasn’t just that they didn’t have a dad…but it was the way he chose to leave. I was saying, “God, You have to fix this. This was not supposed to be their lives. They are not supposed to know pain and brokenness like this. I can’t fix this, but You can.” I felt Him say to me, “Marie, I am not going to fix this, but I am going to redeem it.”. 

God took that weight, that self-imposed pressure that I felt to make it all right, or to be the best mom that I could be… He took that off of my shoulders when He said, “I am going to redeem it”. That became the key to me about how I should approach life. How I should allow Him to bring this workaround. That I should simply allow Him to redeem it. It wasn’t about me making all the right choices, or knowing what I was supposed to do next. I had no idea… there is no book for this. It was just simply about, the fact that I could trust God, that He would bring His plan of redemption. I didn’t have to carry the weight of trying to work all this out. I just had to let Him do it. He was just asking me to open my heart and let Him lead. He wasn’t asking me, “Marie, you have to make all these right choices, you have to follow Me exactly. This all rides on you”. That is not what He was saying at all. He was saying, “I am going to redeem it”. So, I just had to leave the door open for His redemption. 

Do you feel you are at the culmination of redeemed, or do you feel you are in the thick of being redeemed?...

or for the sake of our analogy… Do you feel like you are on the other side, and you are restored?… or do you feel like you are in the thick of being restored? 

And then, when you answer that…maybe you can share some of the how or what that looks like for your story.

I don’t think I will ever get to the point of thinking I am fully redeemed. As much as I felt God saying that He was going to redeem it, I also felt there was a depth that was more than just this instance. His plan wasn’t just about Charlie’s choice. His plan was about lots of things that I had allowed inside of me. A lot of doubts about myself. A lot of my own insecurities. All of that stuff… He planned to redeem it ALL.

Years ago there was a show called “Extreme Home Makeover”. I loved seeing how they would come in, take somebody’s home and transform it into something so much better than they could have ever envisioned. I kind of feel like that was a little bit about what God’s plan for me was in those moments when He said that He was going to redeem it. It wasn’t about the choices that Charlie had made, but it was about… “Marie, I love you enough that I want to bring redemption inside of you, if you’ll let me.” But that was my choice…it is my choice to how deep I let God go. But I knew that as deep as allow the redemption to go, that is where the healing would be. I wanted as much healing as He would let me, because I wanted to be a good mom. I knew that the things inside of my heart, would be the things that I poured on my kids. So, if I didn’t allow God to do His healing, and I walked around with bitterness and anger, and the weight of sorrow.. and fear, stress and anxiety. If that is what I was allowing inside of me, then that was going to be what I poured onto my children. I wanted to authentically love them…and love them with the kind of love that He poured out on me. That meant that I had to let Him in and let Him work.

There are places that I am aware of that He is still bringing redemption into my life. There are places that I am not even aware of that He is still bringing redemption to in my life. As a mom, I can’t wait to see the redemption that He will bring into my kids’ lives. The ones that were 7, 5 and 18 months… are now 20, 18 and 14, and we are very much in the thick of seeing God write their redemption story. 

So, yes.. I have seen some of God’s redemption.

Yes, I am seeing more of it.

And…yes, I believe there is still more to come.

We have this ability to judge our circumstances like it’s the evidence of God's love. To look at our life, or someone else’s life (especially as we scroll through social media) and say, “well, God… You must love that person more, because their life looks a whole lot better than mine”. But I don’t think that is it. I don’t think that God’s love is proved by our circumstance… I think that God’s love is best seen by the way He comes with us and walks with us. He will come right where I am, whether it is a choice that I made, or a place that I am at because of a choice that someone else has made. It doesn’t matter to Him. He will come, and He will be faithful and He will walk. So, for me, some of those places that I have seen redemption are in that deeper understanding where it is like… “ok, Marie, just because these things happened in your life, doesn’t mean that God doesn’t love you. Just because your life hasn’t gone the way that you planned, doesn’t mean that He doesn’t care about those dreams you have inside.”. It is just that these are the circumstances, and if you will let Him, He will walk it out with you. 

Some of the redemption is not based on circumstances, they are based on these deeper truths that He has reset in places where I wasn’t seeing it the right way. He has given me much more self confidence than I have ever had growing up. And that is NOT the thing that you would think that someone would say after walking through these circumstances. He did that immediately. People all around the world wanted me to give an answer for Charlie’s choices. I did not have answers, I had my own unanswerable questions. I could not tell someone something that would make sense. This was just something that did not make sense. So, in that moment for God to come along and give me strength and courage...He reset some of those insecurities that I had about myself. I grew up super shy, very quiet...quite reserved, and people who knew me in high school who now see me are kind of like, “wow, that’s the same person?”. Especially when they come and hear me speaking, and they think about the girl who would have never wanted to be in front of people. I had all of these misconceptions of who I am, and I wouldn’t have ever thought to believe the things that God has shown me now. That I have a voice that matters and I have something to say that is worth hearing. I wouldn’t have ever thought something like that about myself.

Yeah, I so resonate with that. That is what you are sharing...that that is a small example of one of the parts of your redemption. To go back to the analogy, there is the car in the junk yard, the pinto or whatever. It was functioning fine, driving in it’s lane. But in that redemption, in that restoration process, the “Mechanic”... God… the Restorer comes in and says, “ok little Pinto you were doing a good job going down the road, but I am going to take you to my garage, I am going to work on you. It is not going to be easy”.

 And let’s just say the car could pull itself out of the garage and refuse to be worked on. Insist on staying in its little broken situation. But, you (Marie) chose to stay in the garage, and then came out running like you’ve never run before. You came out with a new kind of function, a new kind of sound and a new kind of look.

So, this shy little girl came out and realized that she had a voice. She didn’t have to be shy or weird about it, or even ashamed of it. THAT is a run like you’ve never run before kind of restoration. A restoration where you said, “I am willing”.  

Maybe people who don’t know me, look on the outside and make assumptions. They see this wonderful happy family, they see the Christmas cards and everyone looks happy and smiling. They see my amazing husband and our beautiful blended family and they just assume that THAT is the redemption. And, yes… that is part of it. But, I think, if we judge the level of God’s redemption purely based on circumstances, then we missed the whole point. Because it is not about our circumstance. It is easy to think, “well, God must love her. He brought a redemption that looks like “this”.” He changed her circumstance, she has another husband...whatever. But there are lots of circumstances in our lives that are not going to be changed like that. I would never want someone to assume that God’s level of redemption in my life was solely based on circumstance. It is actually all those things that He has done under the surface that have changed me. That have changed everything. Because in so many places we can’t change our circumstances, but what God can change is the way we see it. He can change the way we see the events of our lives, and the way we see ourselves in it. By us changing our perspective, that changes everything.  

 Jen - 

So, how do you give God that access? 

I appreciate you talking about how difficult that is. It’s not like that car who is saying, “sure, you can work on me”. None of it is easy, and it feels like it costs you something. But really, it doesn’t cost us anything. It is just surrender. We put such a high price on surrender without thinking of the beauty that comes after that. Surrender is painful, scary and unknown...but it is the beauty that comes on the other side of the surrender.  

I think the place that I learned this first was in the loss of my first daughter. I was saying to the Lord, “God, I don’t trust You, and I can’t believe that I don’t trust You. How do I learn to trust You? I have learned the Bible, sat in church, prayed ...and I am saying that I don’t trust You. How do I figure that out now?”. I felt like He was telling me to hold out my hands and let go of the things that I had been holding tightly to for so long. I think that is what it looks like to give God access. Whatever brokenness it is that we are carrying, whatever place it is that we don’t trust Him. Or a place where we have given up on our dreams because we have been so broken. Whatever the painful thing is...we can hold it in our hands, and hold it out, and then open it up to the Lord, and say, “Ok God, here it is. I will give it to You.”  

One of the really amazing things about God is, if we change our minds and take it back and close our hands again. He doesn’t write us off. He says, “ok, come back, open your hands and lets try this again”. So, even for me in that season of life, I know there were days that I did not live with my hands wide open. There were days I held my hands open and days I held them closed. But, all He wants is for us to surrender it to HIm. To give it over to Him. To let Him carry the weight for us. To let Him be the author of our redemption story. And, He is not looking at us, waiting for us to make all those right choices, He is simply asking us to surrender.

He cares about me, He cares about you, He cares about the pain that we are carrying, and He simply wants us to let Him carry it instead. It is not a formula, it is something that you have to work out between you and the Lord. Surrender looks different for each person. Maybe some people are better at surrender than I am. I just know that sometimes it is a struggle, and I don’t think that God is disappointed in that. I think that the more we live in this place of authenticity, a place of saying, “God this is really hard for me, and I don’t even want to open my hands today”. He will meet us there. He will meet us any place we ask Him. There are alot of days where I said, “God, I don’t want what I have in my hands. I don’t want to carry it, and I don’t feel like doing the work of giving it to you…. But I don’t want to live like this. I don’t want this to be the entirety of what I know. So, will You take my crappy attitude. Will You take my feeling bad for myself, my wishing my life would look like somebody else’s...and would You transform that? Will You take THOSE things out of my hands? Because I can’t even give You access to my heart if I”m sitting here saying, I don’t want what my life looks like now, I don’t want to have to do the work of giving it to You right now, and I don’t want to wait for You to write this redemption story. I just want to be different one minute from now. 

I'm thinking of the person who is saying.. “Right!..but how?”
And what your saying is, it is a constant conversation, of “You show me how”.

I’m thinking of the verse where a father in the New Testament is asking for a big miracle. What he ends up saying is, “help me with my unbelief”. I think it is possibly similar with surrender. We say, “I see and I feel the angst inside of me, and I know there is a better way. I believe You are real. I believe that You are God and You are good, and You are love. I know all that, AND I am still over here with a tight grip. There is this big bridge that I can’t cross. Help me with my unbelief. Help me surrender what I can’t surrender on my own”. (Mark 9:24)

I think we all go through hard days. I think, for me, it is difficult to call anything trauma after the whole Amish schoolhouse shooting and everything that went along with that. But, I will say that I have gone through alot of hard days since then. I lost my dad on Christmas Eve a number of years ago. Walking out various forms of brokenness with my kids. I think we all have something difficult we are going through most of the time.. Whether it’s a big, monumental, life altering thing, or just a small kind of, nagging at you hard. When I was a kid growing up, I know this is not what I thought it was supposed to be to be an adult. But, I think that is a part of life, ya know…believing in God doesn’t give you a free pass. .   

We all walk through difficulty. I am not saying that my life is terrible and agonizing and every day awful. I do think it’s a perspective thing. If I wanted to look at my circumstances and see it as all awful and everyday is going to be awful. Then, sure..I could choose to feel like that… anybody could, but what kind of life is that? That is not redemption, that is not who God is, that is not the truth of what He is speaking over my life. So, in any situation, the perspective that I want to choose is, “ok, God, maybe this isn’t what I thought, maybe this is harder than I imagined life was supposed to be when im an adult. But, I know that You are here, I know that You are in it. I know that You are showing me something about who I am, and who You are. I know that You are not just doing this for me. 

God’s redemption is multi-faceted. It is never just about one thing. So, while it is about what He is doing in us… it is also about then having the opportunity to share that with someone else. It is not to say that we can’t be this extension of redemption to somebody else’s life unless our life is perfect. I don’t think that is true, or no one would ever share anything. The conversations that I have had with strangers that have left me jaw dropped in awe, is when someone else will say, “I just want you to know that I am thinking about you, I see the pain you are walking through… because I have walked through something in my own life, and because I have walked through that pain in my own life, it has given me the eyes to see the brokenness in yours”. They don’t have to say that they are on the other side and their life is amazing! Just for someone to come right to where you are and to speak to the authenticity of that… to say, “ I see what you are going through and I want you to know that I care about you, and I love you.'' That means the world, because in those moments we think we are alone. We think that we are the only one that this kind of stuff happens to. But when someone risks it, and says, “Hey, this is where I have been, let me walk with you”. Let me really be here for you, and not just, “if you need anything, call me”, but rather, “let's get coffee, let's talk...whatever, cause I know what it feels like to be in your shoes”. That is huge.

Yes, they are empathizing for you, and in a sense… they are holding hope for you, right? 

Yes, and that just changes it. When you know that you are not alone. Someone else has walked through brokenness, and they are willing to walk through yours.

So, do you have any tips, any ways to walk through the broken times? We talked about surrender, but I am also thinking of things like, self care/soul care...what did that look like for you, and continues to look like for you because you continue to have hard days? You probably use some of the dependency that you learned from when you lost your daughter, and when Charlie’s choices changed the trajectory of alot of your life. You probably now use some of those same tools to help you with your present hard days. 

Marie - 

I think it is alot about grace. Giving ourselves grace. I can be a pretty driven person, I can have alot of expectations on myself, I want things to look a certain way. But, sometimes you need to give yourself grace and say, “ok, maybe this year I am not doing xyz at Christmas or whatever. Not just saying, I have to do all these things, because this is what I have always done. If it is not a place that is giving you life… then, don’t do it. 

Give yourself the grace to be ok with changing the dynamics of what your life looks like...to put it in a place where your getting life, rather than just getting the life sucked out of you.  

I’m really good at giving grace to other people, I’m not so good at giving grace to myself. Sometimes I have to have those conversations where I say, “Ok, what would I be saying if this were someone else’s life?”. In those places where we tell a friend to take a nap, or eating something nutritious. We encourage them to skip the coffee and chocolate because maybe they actually need some protein. All those basic things that are good care tips for any human beings. We have a hard time, rolling them out on ourselves. Sometimes we need a nap more than anything. Sleep is a wonderful tool for restoration, but instead we burn the candle at both ends. We keep going as fast and as hard as humanly possible.

I am trying to do better at taking care of myself, at making margin, and not feeling bad about it. Of thinking, “what do I want to do that brings me joy?’... and then doing it. Whether it is journaling… for some it is very healing to write out all the things that you are thinking, the things that are stressing you and setting them aside. Or taking a walk, getting counseling for sure. I think we have such a negative connotation about counseling… but, it is amazing to talk out your problems with someone who doesn’t have to live out your life!! He or she can give you an impartial opinion, or give you useful tips...and then get together and talk about it again. It is such an incredible gift to have someone who simply wants to listen to you. 

We have no trouble thinking it would be great if someone went out to get a personal trainer to. If I had a friend who said that they were going to take 6 weeks with a personal trainer … I would be like, “Go you!”. But, nobody ever says, “I’m taking 6 weeks to get my mental and emotional health in order, so I got a counselor. I’m gonna see them for 6 weeks, and if at the end of 6 weeks I feel I need more time, I”m going to extend it. I’m also gonna take a nap, and take some walks…”. We ought to be celebrating that in the same way that we would celebrate someone working on their physical body. 

I think that there are some basic things that we can do. We can make sure that we are eating well, drinking enough water, because being dehydrated really does a number on your system. It doesn’t take alot of time, or alot of money, it just takes a little forethought. I eat much better if I plan it out in advance.

Also, do something that is the you that you love. Like, finding those things that really speak to who you are, or what you enjoy. Even if your hobbies change...baking used to be therapy for me, but it is not therapy for me after having 6 children. I cook enough, and that doesn’t feel like fun. So sometimes our hobbies change as our seasons change, but find the thing that brings you joy, and give yourself the grace to do that thing for 15 minutes a day.   

I have told my children that I am going in my room, closing the door and to not bother me unless someone is bleeding profusely! 

I remember when my kids were toddlers and we told our son to “not get out of bed unless it is an emergency”.. To which he said, “so, if my brother’s face is on fire, then can I get out of bed?!”.
 We were like, “um... yes.. You can get out of bed if his face is on fire!!!” (ha ha ha)

Yes, and I think we just have to give ourselves the grace to take care of ourselves well.

I love that. You gave some really specific examples.  But you umbrella-ed all of that with, grace. The FIRST thing that you said was “grace”.   A little line that I like and that I especially like to let overflow into my kids lives is, “you don’t have to be awesome! I am off the hook, I don’t have to be awesome!!”....and neither do you."  This is something that we can extend to our kids!

That umbrella of grace over those little daily baby steps! Because, today, you might not know how to care for yourself...or something like, deep breathing doesn’t come to your mind, or you might not know what is enriching for you. You don’t have to be awesome...you don’t have to figure that all out today.  

Today, might just need to be as simple as it was for you on your porch when you said, “help God”. That is your baby step today.  Or, maybe your baby step is I am going to step out on my porch because the sun is shining and I think it is a good idea for me to see the sunshine. Then, possibly, once I am out there, then God will help me to take that baby step to walk down the driveway, and then maybe… whatever it is, just to start with small healthy/helpful steps.

My friend Meagan is a professional counselor. ( www.takeheartcounseling.com ) She is an equine therapist.  I have learned so much cool stuff about the power of working with animals from the stories that she has told me. Meagan is a dear friend who believes in what God is doing through the Restorable project and through the Hope Layer podcast. She is joining forces with me, and you, and our listeners here by offering a $25 discount for anyone who is in need of a therapist, in need of help. Anyone who is ready to knock on that door and make that first appointment.   

If you feel like your next step might be to talk to someone who is trained and safe, then email Meagan. When you email her, just mention Hope Layer podcast and she will take $25 off of your first session. You will meet at her horse farm and I believe that this will be a really great experience for you. Email Meagan@takeheartcounseling.com

I also want to say that while I see a professional counselor, I also have a holistic practitioner in my life. Through different circumstances I have learned that trauma, age, toxic environments… all that stuff wreaks havoc on our bodies! I remember Lysa Turkeurst ( www.lysaterkeurst.com ) saying something that her counselor told her. She said that her hard stuff will catch up with her and her body would tell her!  

Through different circumstances, I have also chosen to have a holistic practitioner to come alongside of me and care for my physical well being. This woman is passionate about not only my physical health, but also my emotional and spiritual health.  She takes it ALL into consideration when she guides me towards wellness!  I sincerely cannot say enough about Dr. Rhonda...she is fabulous and professional at her job at what she does and puts her whole heart and attention into each client that she sees.  She started as my Dr. for our daughter years ago, and now she is my Dr... who has turned into a dear friend!  Dr. Rhonda is so supportive of what I am doing through Restorable and this podcast, she believes it is a wonderful tool for hope and healing   Because of her passion for whole health, she is also partnering with Hope Layer listeners by offering a $25 discount for her initial exam. Go to her LINK at http://beautifulhealingjourney.com/hopelayer to get your discount.  

I hope these resources can be tangible, practical tools for someone who is in the thick of heavy.  

Because .. if your listening and you are in a season of heavy...then please get help. See my friend Meagan for counseling.. And take care of yourself by allowing Dr. Rhonda to guide you along in your physical wellness.. And, friends if all these restorable conversations have been nurturing to your soul, then I would love for you to join me at my soon coming Restorable Retreat. It will be held in a beautiful bed and breakfast from February 28 - March 1st in Lancaster, PA. It is going to be such a meaningful and powerful weekend for your journey, as I know it will be for mine. Tickets are already being sold, so read about it and sign up www.jenminingerphotography.com/retreats 

Marie, you don't feel like you have anything amazing to offer anybody, except for what God has been given to you...and that is, comfort, hope, redemption...it is a “run like you haven’t run before”. That it is not out of your own will or power, or your own strength. It is just stuff that you have received. And now you are in season where you are ready to comfort others. One of the ways that you are doing that is through a book that you have written.   

I read your book a couple of years ago and it really spoke to me. Your words gave me pictures of hope. I was a little scared of reading it… thinking that maybe I would skim the hard parts. But, Marie...you couldn’t skim the hard parts, but God definitely protected you in the thick of it!! So do you want to share with us what your book is about?

Yes, so I wrote a book called, “One Light Still Shines”. It is my story, and not just my story of the aftermath of the Amish schoolhouse shooting, but it is really a comprehensive view of my childhood and my hopes and dreams and the way God brought his redemption. The way He taught me to trust Him. It is of course also the aftermath of the shooting, and then the beautiful story of meeting my husband, Dan and our family. It is written in such a way that my objective is to share hope. Because we all have those broken places in our lives. It is not just for you to read my story and be like, “oh wow, God did that in her life”. .. but then to come away and say, “God, if you did that in Marie’s life, then what do You have planned for mine?”.  

Whenever I share my story, whether it is someone reading my book, or listening to me speak is to be able to share the comfort that I have received. 

(https://mariemonville.com/)

We will be giving away TWO signed copies of Marie’s book!!

1. follow @mariemonville and @jenminingerphotography on either (or both!!) facebook/instagram