Abby's Story -- A Journey of Faith

(Abby & her brother Aaron)

This past Friday at Ransomed Abby gave her testimony. She talked about the unexpected death of her older brother and how she walked through it as a Christian. I think it is well worth the read and will impact you as it did me and many people that were able to hear it.

I am so thankful for Abby and her willingness to open her life in such a way that demonstrates her love of Christ and her willingness to follow Him in all circumstances, even when it could not be harder to do so. This is an amazing young woman and I pray that others would be willing to open their lives as Abby has.


Abby’s Story

I don’t even know where to begin. I could start back to freshman year at IUP when I had a roommate whose brother died in a car accident July before she came to school. I had two friends who died in a car accident that June, so I thought that I could somewhat relate to what she was going through-I was not even close. When my brother died everything that I didn’t understand about Kelly clicked.

Since freshman year I have been sporadically searching for God’s truths and trying to build my understanding and faith in Him. I slowly but surely began to turn away from worldy things. I have many examples of the sins that I have turned and am still working on turning away from if you ever want to hear them. But that is not why I am here tonight.

During the 2005-2006 school year, I felt burdened in my heart to pray that Aaron (my brother) would open his heart to the Lord and accept Jesus as his savior. I faithfully prayed this prayer almost everyday for over a year. Then right before last summer in 2006, I felt God telling me to speak to Aaron about the Lord, and to protect him from driving drunk. Also during this time I had just freed myself from an abusive relationship, and until my brother died on December 2, 2006 that was the hardest thing I had to endure. As I look back on that situation now, it seems like a piece of cake. When I went home that summer, I went to church on Sundays and that was about it. I ignored God’s call to speak to Aaron more about Jesus and was too selfish to go out with him at night and drive him home. I made excuses…I didn’t want to stay out that late, I hated seeing Aaron drunk, I wanted to help him but on my terms.

I do remember one conversation I had with him that summer about Jesus. I asked Aaron if he believed in Jesus and he said yes with no hesitation. I pushed further and said that you need to accept him into her heart that there is more to it than just believing. I asked him if he had accepted in his heart that Jesus died for our sins and saved us. He said yes but didn’t want to discuss it further. He also told me that he did want to start going to church again, but he was so tired from working all week that he didn’t feel like getting up in the morning on Sunday. He did start reading the book A Purpose Driven Life which I gave him as a Christmas present. Those are the things that I have to hold on to.

As you can probably tell from what I have already said, Aaron liked to party. He liked to get drunk, and for about the last year of his life he liked to take pills. Another thing I felt pushed to pursue that summer was the fact that I knew he was doing drugs. I caught him buying pills from someone and I even found what he had bought. I confronted one of his friends about it and he reassured me that it was just a phase. I confronted Aaron about it and he told me that he was just taking the pills to help him go to sleep-which he was having difficulty falling asleep. So I encouraged him to go to the Doctor to get those pills, and I just believed what he told me. I did not push the issue any further. I look back on that now and wish I could have gotten him help-told my parents-figured out that he did have a serious drug problem. But I didn’t and I now have to live the rest of my life knowing that I could have done more that maybe would have saved his life.

I don’t want to leave you with the impression that my brother was all drugs and alcohol because he was much much more than that. He was so funny that he could make anyone laugh. He was a hard worker and very smart-he worked in the hospital with my mom as a nurses aid but knew how to do everything the nurses did. He hated gossip. And he knew how to put me in my place when I was freaking out about something that didn’t matter-like getting an A on a test or getting upset because someone didn’t like me. He was my big brother; my protector. I always felt safe when I was with him. I knew he would never let anything bad happen to me. He was the person I learned from and who accepted me into his group of friends. He was my socializor when I came home from college. He was the one person I thought would be with me for the rest of my life. He was so important and normal to my being that I didn’t realize how much he was a part of me until he was gone. I now have a piece of me missing.

Aaron died December 2, 2006 in his bed from heart disease. He had 2 clogged arteries and an enlarged heart that doctors never knew about. The one thing that I never thought would happen to me did and I am still here. You see death all around you and you see the families and wonder how do they do it? I remember thinking about my roommate freshman year and saying that I don’t know what I would ever do it I didn’t have Aaron. Well unfortunately that day did come for me and the only thing that has gotten me through his death is knowing God will never leave me no matter what. He also sent me some awesome friends to care for me during this time. When you lose someone that close to you this overwhelming cloud of loneliness fills your entire body.

I know that people deal with death differently, but I needed people around all the time. I needed to feel that love and support and I hated being by myself.

I have written down verses that I read over and over to help comfort me:

“Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith. Remember that your Christian brothers and sisters all over the world are going through the same kind of suffering you are. 10 In his kindness God called you to share in his eternal glory by means of Christ Jesus. So after you have suffered a little while, he will restore, support, and strengthen you, and he will place you on a firm foundation. 11 All power to him forever! Amen” (1 Peter 5:9-11).

“I cried out, “I am slipping!” but your unfailing love, O Lord, supported me. 19 When doubts filled my mind, your comfort gave me renewed hope and cheer” (Psalm 94:18-19).

“For I know the plans I have for you,” says the Lord. “They are plans for good and not for disaster, to give you a future and a hope. 12 In those days when you pray, I will listen. 13 If you look for me wholeheartedly, you will find me” (Jeremiah 29:11-13).

“And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words. 27 And the Father who knows all hearts knows what the Spirit is saying, for the Spirit pleads for us believers in harmony with God’s own will. 28 And we know that God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love God and are called according to his purpose for them” (Romans 8:26-28).

“For no one is abandoned by the Lord forever. Though he brings grief, he also shows compassion because of the greatness of his unfailing love. For he does not enjoy hurting people or causing them sorrow” (Lamentations 3:31-33).

“Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).

“Let him have al your worries and cares, for he is always thinking about you and watching everything that concerns you” (1 Peter 5:7).

“Think about the things of heaven, not the things of earth” (Colossians 3:2).

“Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live, even after dying. 26 Everyone who lives in me and believes in me will never ever die. . . ” (John 11:25-26)

Right after Aaron died all I wanted was to know that he was still with me and to know that he was definitely in heaven. I began looking into mediums and reading books about people who have contact with spirits. I couldn’t accept that Aaron was gone. I just wanted to have contact with him. I tried to wish him back to life. I would look for signs that he was still around. And I have to look further into this, but some spots in the bible say that if you are looking to see things that aren’t of God he will provide them for you. A verse that supports this is:

“The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, 10and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. 11For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie” (2 Thessalonians 2:9-11 NIV).

To me this is saying that if you are searching things of Satan, God will allow you to believe this lie and even give you signs affirming this lie.

So I will just give you a small explanation of what happened to me concerning mediums. I believed that Aaron was still around, and I searched for signs all the time. My mom also got into this same belief, and unfortunately she is still there. I have been praying that she has a bad experience so she is not deceived any longer. But for her thinking Aaron is here is comforting and she is not ready to let go yet.

My mom pursued a medium, and found out that spirits can connect with you through electrical things…so like the tv and lights etc. Well we found our satellite dish got messed up an extremely abnormal amount of times, and our cat get real goofy so we thought that was Aaron saying hi. Then one night it was late and my friend just left. I was upstairs talking on a phone and I heard a man’s voice yell something from downstairs. I immediately froze and got scared. Then another night I woke up and heard a child screaming 3 times. I was being counseled by Alan at this time and told him about it. He told me that since my mom went to the medium she had opened the door to all these evil spirits so he told me to ask God to protect me and my room and the family room where I spend most of the time in the house. So I did, and nothing weird has happened to me since. The hardest part for me to stop believing in the medium was to accept that Aaron is not here.

After Aaron passed away I questioned God up and down. Why did you take him away from me? Why didn’t the doctors know about his condition? Did he take drugs that night? Why me? Why did you allow this to happen? A lot of “why” questions. I was angry with God and I let him know it. I still get angry, but I also know deep down that God is all good and that he loves me and he loves Aaron.

I think about Aaron every day multiple times during the day. When I talked to a friend who lost her brother 4 years ago, she told me that she still thinks of her brother everyday throughout the day. I thought wow…that’s a lot I don’t think I will be like that. It has only been 10 months since Aaron died, but I still think of him just as much as I did when he first passed away. I have realized that I will think of him everyday multiple times during the day for the rest of my life. Loss doesn’t go away for family members.

One thing I would like you to take away from my speaking is to have a better understanding of what family members of someone who has died go through. It doesn’t matter if it has been 3 months, 5 years, 10 years or more. We are still in pain, and we will never get over it. There are times when it hurts more than others, like right now as I am writing this I had that feeling of sickness pass through me.

The other thing I want you to take away from this is DON’T WAIT! First of all please don’t wait to accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior. Don’t wait to let him lead your life. Don’t wait to follow his word or take that step of faith and carry out something that he is telling you to do. Don’t wait to share your faith with the people you love. I don’t want any of you living the rest of your life hanging on to the hope that your brother chose Jesus. It would be much better to know. And if you have shared your faith and planted that seed, then pray and believe that God will answer your prayer.
The Bible says:

“And when the disciples saw it, they marveled, saying, “How did the fig tree wither away so soon?” 21 So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ it will be done. 22 And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive” (Matthew 21:20-22).

"I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing. 6If anyone does not remain in me, he is like a branch that is thrown away and withers; such branches are picked up, thrown into the fire and burned. 7If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be given you. 8This is to my Father's glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples” (John 15:5-8).

A few God coincidences that happened before Aaron died:

-I had a few people coming to me and asking me about my beliefs so I was challenged to dig deeper and look things up about Jesus.

-There was a point where Karen Salser-my bible study leader-told me that God was preparing me for something. I told my roommate Audra this and she said what if something bad happens. We both got totally silent and felt this huge burden come upon us. I immediately thought that I was going to die. That night I called Aaron and told him that some weird things were happening and I just wanted him to know that I love him very much.

-November 19th and 26th church spoke about who bad things happen to good people. I wrote down key points on how to deal with grief.

-Around November 26 I actually prepared a bible study on Ecclesiastes 8:8-17, “No man has power over the wind to contain it; so no one has power over the day of his death. As no one is discharged in time of war, so wickedness will not release those who practice it. All this I saw, as I applied my mind to everything done under the sun. There is a time when a man lords it over others to his own hurt. 10 Then too, I saw the wicked buried—those who used to come and go from the holy place and receive praise in the city where they did this. This too is meaningless. 11 When the sentence for a crime is not quickly carried out, the hearts of the people are filled with schemes to do wrong. 12 Although a wicked man commits a hundred crimes and still lives a long time, I know that it will go better with God-fearing men, who are reverent before God. 13 Yet because the wicked do not fear God, it will not go well with them, and their days will not lengthen like a shadow. 14 There is something else meaningless that occurs on earth: righteous men who get what the wicked deserve, and wicked men who get what the righteous deserve. This too, I say, is meaningless. 15 So I commend the enjoyment of life, because nothing is better for a man under the sun than to eat and drink and be glad. Then joy will accompany him in his work all the days of the life God has given him under the sun. 16 When I applied my mind to know wisdom and to observe man's labor on earth—his eyes not seeing sleep day or night- 17 then I saw all that God has done. No one can comprehend what goes on under the sun. Despite all his efforts to search it out, man cannot discover its meaning. Even if a wise man claims he knows, he cannot really comprehend it.”

I read those words at the end of November and came to the conclusion that “some questions in life just can’t be answered. Its times like these where we must hold on the Jesus. When problems come I find myself closer to God because I need him more than ever to get through the hard times. We must choose to be better rather than bitter.”

I also wrote this: “Further on in the chapter 8 of Ecclesiastes, Solomon who wrote it, tells us what to do about life’s unanswered questions: He says to enjoy life, enjoy what God has given us. Not even the combined wisdom of all the people in the world would be able to fully comprehend God and what he has done and plans to do. There will always be unanswered questions but we cannot let these questions lessen our faith or the joy that He has given us. We must be comforted by the trust that we have in Jesus-that he is in control.”
That was the last entry I had in my journal before Aaron died.

I know that I am blessed by God giving me the time to become closer to Him before Aaron died. It is very easy to turn away from God when something terrible like that happens. If he would have died before I went to college, I would have turned from him. I am not okay with his death and I hurt everyday. But I do live with a desire to follow Jesus and continue to grow in my faith.

A few things that I have noticed changed significantly after Aaron died:
I used to have bad anxiety about school. That was nonexistent after he died. I mean really, does getting good grades really matter that much? They definitely should not get in the way of you forming and keeping good relationships with friends and family.