.
Coming to Holland solved all the problems just as we had thought it would. No more money problems, job problems, housing and neighbour problems, problems with my parents, or school and environment problems concerning the children. All solved in one gigantic, instantaneous move! The greatest gift for me was the school situation which was like paradise, a wonderful dream come true. I had been extremely troubled by the school situation in Israel, as well as the aggressive social environment for our children and now a great burden was removed. There are only about fifty children in the school here each year because it's a small village school and it has always had a wonderful, calm atmosphere.
At the age of seven and a half Aviv suddenly had to learn a new language. I'm grateful that God had led us to speak English in our home rather than Hebrew as I wanted our children to be bilingual. Because of that, Aviv had no problems communicating with the teachers and also the older children who were fascinated by this English speaking boy from a far away land, as well as a social worker who came to the school once a week for several months to talk to him. Aviv learnt to read and write Dutch with the class below him and did arithmatic with the children in his own class. Gradually he caught up with Dutch till he could join in with the children in his own class but he does regret that he has forgotten almost all of his Hebrew. I simply did not have the wisdom to keep up two languages with him and it's not good for one parent to speak two languages to a child because the child can get both languages mixed up. The schools here receive children from the age of four so I only had to wait six months before Matanya could begin school in a wonderfully peaceful setting. I was also priviliged to receive an invitation to spend one day in school with Matanya for each of his first three years. Every mother would receive this invitation, each on a different day where they could see how their children were getting along. This was a dream come true for me. I had so much wanted this when Aviv went to nursery school in Israel and I had asked there if I could come and be with him for just a short while but I was refused. I knew at the time that I was requesting something out of the ordinary but I was nevertheless disappointed at the refusal. I was therefore greatly and pleasantly surprised to find that here, at least in this school, it was the norm and it was a great joy for me to receive this written invitation each year to come and have coffee with the teacher and be with Matanya in a different setting. Both boys were so well received and have done well in school with Aviv graduating at the age of seventeen. I praise God for this great gift of leading us to a wonderful environment where it is a dream to bring up children. In fact, words fail me to know how to express my deep gratitude to God for this great and wonderful gift where I could rest in my heart knowing that my children were well taken care of.
But for me personally, this move opened up a whole new can of worms and if it's possible to compare the tough times in my life, this was perhaps the worst. Right from the beginning, I had a tough time adapting to village life and I'm quite sure that had the Lord moved us to a city instead of a village, I would have had no trouble adapting at all. For several years, I had already been aware of the fact that I would not be able to cope anywhere else except in the city and Kees and I had had some fierce arguments in the past because he only wanted to live in a rural area, anywhere away from the city. The arguments were unnecessary though because on the two occasions when we had moved, God had clearly led us. The first time I had gotten my way by being in the city and now Kees had gotten his way by being in a village. Because God had so clearly led us on both of these occasions, it was out of the question to blame the other. In this particular case, we had only known a few days before we arrived that we would be living in a village. I couldn't drive, public transport is not good and doesn't take you very far, and I had this need to be out and about and do whatever needed to be done out of the house. I was a brisk walker, loved it and needed it. It energized me and this was my way of getting exercise. On the rare occasion in the past when I had had nothing to do in the city on a particular day, I still had to get out and go and I'd always found something that needed to be done. Doctor, dentist, accountant, lawyer, insurance, paying bills, shopping for bargains, banking, taking the children to play in the park etc, this was my thing! I had tons of energy, loved charging along the streets and I was unstoppable. Now in a tiny village with no shops or offices whatsoever, I had nowhere to go and nothing to do and I don't enjoy wandering around aimlessly or simply going out to look at a view. I was suddenly cut off from my daily routine of running around for all practical purposes. I felt disorientated, had no idea how to spend my time and it took me years to acclimatize to this strange situation. I knew nothing about computers and didn't want to know about that either, nor was there a bookshop where I could find myself a book to read. Housework may have been a logical conclusion as a good way to make use of my time but I didn't know what it was to clean a home as I had grown up with a servant and had never had to lift a finger. Now it seemed as though housework was the only thing left for me to do yet I didn't know how to begin doing something which seemed so dreary and I had no motivation to get into it so it was not unusual for me to just sit on the couch for ages and stare into space-- bored, lost and troubled not knowing what to do with myself. I would recall the days when I was a postlady, running energetically through the streets. One section of my route had had low appartments with wide open windows and whenever I ran past I would see the women hanging out their bedding and being awfully busy with housework. I remember thinking to myself that I would never be able to do that. I didn't look down upon them. I just couldn't relate to what they were doing which seemed awfully boring and meaningless to me. And when I ran around the streets, bursting with energy, I felt wonderfully free and happy as a lark. Cleaning was not in my blood. Running around for practical purposes was. But now I felt that I was in prison-- isolated, shut up and severed from everything that I was familiar with and powerless to change the circumstances.
This was also not easy for Kees because everything that I was used to doing suddenly fell on his shoulders which put a strain on our relationship. We did consider moving but two things stopped us. The first was that we were convinced that God had moved us where He wanted us to be and His will was (and still is) our first priority in life. The second thing was that I wasn't happy to think about going somewhere more central and then taking a chance that it may not be good for our boys. This was something that Kees was also deeply concerned about. He felt greatly responsible for his Jewish/Israeli children and due to growing antisemitism in Holland, he didn't want to take a chance that they would be a target for bullies in a larger city school. Neither of us was willing to take the chance of putting my own needs above the needs of our children. So we stayed put and we both firmly believe till today that this has been God's will for us.
I'm very self conscious and it's easy to hide in the crowds in the city. Not in a village. Here everyone knows and greets each other. Even if you don't know a person you still greet them. This was so foreign to me and so extremely uncomfortable to a person like myself who is inhibited and likes to be inconspicuous that I simply couldn't face going out and there may have been weeks, if not months when I never stepped outside the front door, except perhaps once in a while to go in the car to the supermarket for a weekly shop, if I had not had an argument with Kees beforehand. My body would be itching and aching for excercise but the emotional strain of being seen and possibly even being known by strangers and having to greet them while on a walk leading to nowhere was just more than what I could bear. I did ride a bike sometimes but I never got the same satisfaction out of that as I'm very unstable and nervous on a bike. I took many driving lessons but it became clear that I was getting nowhere as I tend to panic greatly on the roads. When I should have been more than ready to take my test, I realised that it would be better for me as well as the rest of Holland not to have me sitting in the drivers seat and it seemed as though God was agreeing with me when our money suddenly ran out.
Yes, the money-- we weren't sure about the best way to invest the money from the sale of our appartment and Kees got involved in a business venture and lost most of it several months after I arrived! Due to depression, another problem which he inherited from his father, he also never worked for close to a year so we also lived off a fair bit of money at the time and my inheritance which had been my security blanket soon totally disappeared. I had needed that money to depend on if Kees was ever without a job or if for some reason we went through a time of being in need. We had certainly had our money problems in the past so I felt particularly insecure and needy moneywise due to all of the financial nightmares that I'd been through. But even before the money disappeared, I realised that I had been leaning on it for security and it made sense to me that God would allow it to disappear as we are to have no idols in our lives. Of course, God meant it for good to build up my trust in Him and till today he has always supplied our every need but at the time it was a terribly frightful situation for me; yet I had no choice but to face my great insecurity and I felt as if the floor had been ripped out from under my feet.
At the same time, I was battling to recover from the emotional strain of breaking free from controlling relationships in my family in Israel which had caused severe conflicts and spiritual warfare. I'm grateful to Kees and my prayer partner who were supportive towards me and especially grateful to my brother, a firm believer who had inside understanding of our family dynamics. Without him I may have thought that I was going insane! Only those who have dealt with controlling or manipulative relationships can understand that in order to come out from under the power of oppression you have to say no to other peoples expectations where in the past you had never done such a thing. This causes great chaos, confusion and pain in the relationship and in my case, this took place at a time when my father's health was declining and their needs were greater than usual. And at the very climax, when my father died, the Lord led me away, far away! From the perspective of my family who do not know God, it is understandable that they thought very badly of me. I did offer to help them with various things and I never turned down a request without offering to do something else, but it was inexcusable and incomprehensible to them that I was suddenly saying no to their requests which they thought reasonable. I could obviously not be depended upon in their time of great need. What was worse was that I was even going to abandon them by moving to Holland and would be leaving my mother alone to face her terrible distress when my father was in such a weakened state of health. But this situation was clearly God's doing and God's timing, not mine. He chose that period of time to set me free from being under the oppressive power of control. I felt as though God was delivering me out of the hands of Pharoah from ancient Egypt and as the time drew closer to my leaving the oppression grew greater. I became more and more desperate to flee but had to wait until God let me go. My father died a few days after I left Israel and I went back for the funeral but it had become evident even before I left Israel that my name had been slandered behind my back to relatives and friends of family. I knew that in reality I wasn't guilty of anything because everything had been God's doing but I was in terrible anguish that I was suddenly known as a despicable person who had abandoned my mother in her time of need. What was worse is that I didn't know who had been told what and who regarded me as a friend and who regarded me as an enemy. I didn't know if I had any friends at all because it seemed to me that I was most likely a curse in the eyes of everyone who knew me. My imagination ran wild and ate me up. I knew that I had to forgive but it took me a couple of years of being tormented in my mind and wrestling with this before God before I could forgive and find peace.
A few months after I arrived I also got pregnant. I felt extremely sick, to the extent that I couldn't eat or drink. The children were not getting along well and my state of mind was already so bad that I felt unable to face this pregnancy and accept that another child was on it's way. I wanted to want and receive this baby but due to what I was going through, my heart was not in it and it seemed to increase the heavy burden of all I was going through. Finally, when I was almost three months pregnant, I came to a place of acceptance of this new life within me, and then discovered from a check up that I had miscarried as the baby's hearbeat had stopped. Another trauma to deal with! I had just told my children a day or two beforehand that a new baby would be born into our family and now I had to tell them that this child had died and that I needed to go to hospital for a short while. I told them that one day we would have another baby but in fact I was never able to get pregnant again. After putting two and two together, I later realised that the medical profession had scarred me badly enough so that I would never again be able to bear children. This was a mighty sad revelation for me and I suffered with a spirit of grief.
Due to so many things falling apart in my life, my prayer partner from Israel became convinced that I was somehow at fault. She had expected this move to bring about good things for me and had been a great support to me but had grown tired of watching my life crumble and go from bad to worse. I had also accidently told her that I believed that the Lord had led me not to take birth control. I perceived correctly that she would not be able to relate to this, especially at such a time in my life. Now I was having to deal with one of 'Jobs friends', being accused of all kinds of things which she wrongly perceived or could not relate to. I felt the Lord telling me to let go of this relationship as I sensed that she'd had enough of me and didn't want to continue on with our friendship. But I also understood that the Lord was calling me to depend on Him only. But now I had more pain and more forgiveness to work through as I was wrongly accused of not dealing appropriately with various things in my life.
My relationship with Kees also deteriorated to such an extent that it was possibly worse than it had ever been before, even during our early years of marriage. It couldn't get any worse! I was dependent on him for all practical purposes yet the enmity between us was so great that he was unable to fulfil any of my wants or needs. We were like cat and dog and it was simply sheer hell. There has never been any physical violence between us but I know from both sides that we came pretty close and it was truly miraculous that no-one was ever hurt! (Just as miraculous is that today we get on well and there is no sign of the wild fury that once raged between us for more than thirteen years!)
The only thing which kept me sane was that I had to go school for a year and a half to learn Dutch. I could get out every morning for three hours and I loved the challenge of learning a new language. I was fortunate that I had a background in Afrikaans which helped me to catch onto the language quickly and far more easily than the other students. The Lord provided me with a wonderful teacher who had a fantastic sense of humour and could turn the most boring grammer lesson into a time of great hilarity. Laughter is the best medicine!! But when my school days ended, I was on my own, alone and lost in a painful and bewildering situation. I had no church, no family support, no friends, no familiar exercise or daily routines, no prayer partner, my fertility abruptly cut off, a lost inheritance, a horrendous marriage yet totally dependant on Kees for all practical matters, rejected by many, imprisoned in a house and strange village and no goal or vision for the future. In my previous trials, it was as if God had taken the roof off the house. This time it seemed as though He had taken off the roof, brought down all five walls and ripped the floor out from under my feet! For the first time as a mother, I wanted to commit suicide. I would lie down on the bed in the middle of the day, dazed and bursting with pain that was piercing me from several different directions, unable to be with my children and stop their arguing which was no doubt a reflection of the chaos in my heart as well as in the home.
How could this situation improve when I was in such a bad state of mind? I received no verses now from the Lord. He doesn't come to us and comfort us when we think that it's time. I knew I had done no wrong and I simply had to trust that God had not deserted me, that all of this was His doing for my good and that He loved me. I had no choice but to walk by faith and not by sight and I had enough faith from my past experiences with God to know that He truly was with me and would lead me through this. Yet my suffering was severe.
There came a time when I began to ponder the words that I had received in the past from the Lord. Now I understood why I had received those scripture verses from Deuteronomy before I left Israel, that the Lord would lead me to a new land and bless me. I thought of Rick Joyner's words--Between the promise and the promised land there lies a wilderness. I recalled the story of Joseph who received dreams from God and the next thing he was taken as a slave to Egypt and later thrown into prison. I thought of King David, anointed to be king and the next thing he was fleeing for his life and he was on the run for many years. I was and still am convinced that my circumstances were not the result of a mistake, sin or disobedience in my life but rather that it was God's plan for me to go through this fiery furnace in order to further purify me and He gave me those verses of scripture ahead of time to hang onto during this tempestuous time. That word from Deuterononmy and the message from Rick Joyner was never far from my mind and in addition to that I reflected on various other words that I had received in my life. I also began to dwell on the dream that the Lord had given me after I broke up with Joey. When I had woken up from that dream, I knew that I had been in the presence of the Lord but had never thought much about it. Now I understood that the Lord had been telling me in that dream that He would take me by the hand and lead me throughout my life. When I considered all these things and thought of the way God had worked in the lives of His chosen ones in the bible, I knew that I could trust Him and that He would restore me as He had once told me, though I couldn't imagine how. I was overwhelmed with pain but at least I had peace with God and was grateful for these words from the past which I could meditate on and cling to in the midst of the furious storm, believing in faith that God would restore me in His perfect time.
It is very common when you live in Israel to think that to leave the country is a sign of defeat or simply walking out of God's will. That's what goes through peoples minds and it may sometimes be true, but not necessarily so. In the Hebrew language you also talk about 'going up' to Israel as if you're getting closer to God and His will, or 'going down' from Israel and getting further away. This is also quite biblical as God led the Israelites to the Promised Land and when they were disobedient they were taken out of the Land into captivity. I knew that some of the believers in Israel would consider these things especially because I was going through such a tough time which may give the appearance of having stepped out of God's will. I recall the day that a friend from Israel phoned up and hinted at that and I thank my God for the word that He had given me before I left Israel so that I could say with absolute certainty "I know that God led us here. This is His doing". I also stressed and wholeheartedly believe that going through difficulties and also leaving Israel is not a sure sign of not being in God's will. Did God not lead the Israelites to Egypt when famine came to the land of Canaan? Did God not lead Joseph and Mary to Egypt when Jesus was a baby? Also, going through a good time is not a sure sign of being in God's will, nor a trial being out of His will as we can see in the story of Job as well as others in the Old Testament. In fact, the opposite may actually be true. So in all the battles that I faced, I had peace knowing that God loved me and that this was His doing. Though nothing made sense, I knew by faith that He had not abandoned me and that I could trust in Him. It was impossible to see into the future but I knew that somehow He would bring me through these trials, restore me and bless me according to the various words that I had received in the past.
But how did I deal with the painful situations? Every issue that tormented me was simply a matter of walking it out with the Lord until I was able to come to terms with it. Some things such as the loss of money and the thoughts of suicide were dealt with fairly easily. Not that it was easy but it was easier compared to other things. I simply had no choice but to hand over my fears and pain to the Lord until I received His peace.
Regarding suicide, I came to a point where I knew that I couldn't go along with it. Kees's mother died when he was nine and he still carries that pain with him till today. My children were then four + and eight + and though I desperately wanted to end my suffering, I realised how selfish it would be towards my family if I were suddenly gone. I was fortunately able to think clearly on their behalf and I knew that it would be better to have a distressed and non-functioning wife and mother rather than a dead one. At least in the former there is always a chance of recovery! Though I couldn't stand the pain and could not see into the future, I came to realise that I just had to bear life in the present as best as I could. I considered that I had taken the privilege to bear children when I was younger and now for their sake, I had to continue to bear my responsibility towards them and choose to live. Once I had come to that decision, I simply rejected Satan along with those evil thoughts when they came to my mind. This occurred on two more occasions after that decision and thereafter I never had a problem again.
Regarding the miscarriage, I had to hand my sadness over to the Lord until I received His peace. But later I realised that I wouldn't be able to have any more children ever again which was heartwrenching. It seemed so unfair especially seeing that I had never taken contraception. We had been open to receive however many children God would bring our way and we had expected at the very least one more child. The realisation that my fertility had been cut off, stolen from me before it's natural time ended, brought on another time of grieving for me. Once again I had no choice but to hand over my spirit of grief to the Lord and submit to His will in this area until I received His peace. Today I see the goodness of our wonderful God and am immensely grateful that He granted us two beautiful boys.
Forgiving family members who had hurt me was a giant hurdle which I struggled with for years but I never gave up and with God's help I have overcome and forgiven all the people that I needed to and all the relationships today are healthy and good. Perhaps there are scars that remain but even after the Lord's resurrection he still had scars on his hands, his feet and in his side and I expect that all of His children will bear the scars of traumas and difficulties that they have gone through.
Getting used to village life was a greater challenge to overcome and was a very gradual process of just getting out and getting used to it and also learning to stay put and not run around all day and spend time doing what felt good. As for marriage that was the greatest challenge of all.............
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To those of us who are committed to serving God, He will bring us trials and tribulations, each one perfectly suited to us and we may find ourselves in hopeless circumstances, not seeing a way out and not knowing when the trial will end. Often enough it can take years. We can look to King David and Joseph who both had to walk along harsh and rocky paths laid out by God which lasted many years. For both of them, there was no apparent deliverance in sight and they had no choice but to put their hope, faith and trust in God that He would deliver them in His good time. God wants to strengthen our faith and make us humble servants. He can only do that by taking us through painful and frightening things. This is our cross to bear. Some may succeed in getting off that cross and saving themselves but that is not God's way. It is His will that we are like clay, soft and pliable in his loving hands. We need to take care that we are not hard and stiff necked so that God has no pleasure in molding us. Some people may question if God would really take us through such terrible hardship and make things still worse? We can see that this is what He did in the story of Job. God left Satan on earth for a reason-- he is a tool in God's hand to purify us as we can see here.
We can see here that God was using Satan to test Job and that God Himself initiated the conversation with Satan, telling him to go ahead and do to him all that was in his power, except to harm him. God was proud of Job and wanted to prove that Job's blamelessness and righteousness was not dependent on God prospering him. Through the coming trial God would also continue to perfect him, teach him and be glorified through his humility and blameless heart. As we know, Job lost all that he owned--his wealth as well as his family but he passed the test and it says in verse 22: In all this Job did not sin or charge God with wrong.
May we too pass this test well just as Job did and so be pleasing to God. But Job's suffering didn't end there. In chapter two, God had a similar conversation with Satan as in chapter one. Satan declared that Job passed the test because he had not been physically afflicted so once again God invited him to test Job by afflicting him physically but to spare his life. So Job's troubles got even worse. Now he was suffering with terrible sores all over his body, a wife who told him to curse God and die and his famous friends who accused him of sinning which they saw as a logical conclusion to the continuing calamities. Honestly, if you think about it, it couldn't have gotten any worse. I wonder how we would respond when seeing one of our brothers or sisters going through a severe trial that seems never-ending. Would we consider that they may be out of the will of God? Would we criticise them or speak behind their backs or would we seek to befriend them and comfort them? And how would we respond if we go through something so devastating? Would we get angry at God and reject Him or would we strengthen ourselves in Him as King David did.
Some of the things that we can learn from the book of Job is that yes, things can go from bad to worse. Yes, it is a satanic attack and yes, all of it is God's perfect will. God boasts about Job to Satan and He especially chose for Job to go through that deep, dark valley. He knew that He could trust Job with that severe trial and wanted to further purify him and humble him. Job's life was a sweet fragrance to God and He would mold him even more so in His image. What was Job's response after being tested?
Job claimed that initially he knew about God by hearing about him but now he had seen God and 'knew' him, not just knew about him. It is also apparent from the above verses that Job is now even more humble than what he was before the trial. What a beautiful work that God did by crushing him. If God was happy with Job before the trials we can imagine how thrilled He is now with this blameless man who is even more humble. And God rewarded Job even more so after the trial. But the full rewards are to be met after we leave this earth.
This is the whole point of why God brings us difficulties--He wants to bring us closer to Himself, to purify us and abundantly bless us. Our problem is that we tend to be shortsighted and think that we ought to be blessed now, without much suffering. But as God wrote through Isaiah in chapter 55, His ways are not our ways.
I want to use this story to encourage people who are going through severe trials that are not apparently due to sin. God has a good purpose in your trial. Take care to be soft and pliable so that He can mold you into the image of Yeshua and in due time He will restore you and exalt you.
But even if you are suffering due to sin or a mistake, if you give yourself into God's hands He will forgive us. Like a true father, He has a loving and merciful heart and longs to reach out and forgive us but will only do so if we seek His forgiveness and repent. It is impossible to go through life without making mistakes. Even the greatest of saints have made mistakes and fallen into sin, such as Abraham, Moses, David etc. The important thing is to learn from our mistakes and to repent when God convicts us. When we are humble and seek His forgiveness, He is only too happy to forgive us and will use it to mold us into the image of Yeshua. He will also give us the power to overcome and He will be greatly pleased and glorified through that.
I sometimes wonder how long Job's time of trouble lasted. With many of the saints in the bible it seems at first glance that their trials ended as quickly as they began but sometimes we have enough information that we can work things out and discover that they lasted for many years. We cannot figure out how long Job's troubles lasted but it is possible that he went through his troubles for many years. And often that is how long it takes for God to mold us.
Here is an excellent article to read about going through the furnace. His sheep.org
I will not doubt, though all my ships at sea
Come drifting home with broken masts and sails;
I will believe the hand which never fails,
From seeming evil worketh good for me.
And though I weep because those sails are tattered,
Still will I cry, while my best hopes lie shattered:
" I trust in thee."
I will not doubt, though all my prayers return,
Unanswered from the still, white realm above;
I will believe it is an all-wise love
Which has refused these things for which I yearn;
And though at times I cannot keep from grieving,
Yet the pure ardour of my fixed believing
Undimmed shall burn.
I will not doubt, though sorrows fall like rain,
And troubles swarm like bees about a hive.
I will believe the heights for which I strive
Are only reached by anguish and by pain;
And though I groan and writhe beneath my crosses,
I yet shall see through my severest losses
The greater gain.
I will not doubt. Well anchored is this faith,
Like some staunch ship, my soul braves every gale;
So strong its courage that it will not quail
To breast the unknown mighty sea of death.
Oh, may I cry, though my body parts with spirit,
"I do not doubt," so listening worlds may hear it.
With my last breath.