I'm the daughter of an Episcopal priest. My father, who is not alive now, but was dead even while he lived in his role as a father. He was addressed as Father Strange, and his name was Harvey Strange. As far as I could tell, he was a stranger to Jesus, and though he went through years of seminary, and theology, and psychology, and gained the title of Priest, he never learned how to be one to his own children or Gods children. He spoke several languages, but he probably seldom told the truth in any of them. He was overcome by every vice in life, drinking, smoking, overeating, inordinate sexual indulgence, and he was extremely overweight. He was never an example of a faithful overcomer, and died alone in his trash, filth, and hundreds of books. He was ever learning, but never came to the knowledge of the truth. He and my mother divorced when I was two, and he was a stranger to me.

I was number six out of seven children, and my mother remarried a man named Jim when I was nine. He had no idea how to cope with children, and though he attended church faithfully, he didn't have a clue how to reach me. He was a cold, indifferent, critical man, and he had no father, spiritually, or carnally, to show him how to love children. Though he fulfilled outward obligations and duties, he constantly was inwardly cursing me. He had a relationship with his religious ceremony, not Jesus, The Way, The Truth, and The Life! As he was dying of cancer when I was 16, his heart was broken because he knew he hadn't known Jesus and wasn't able to impart the spirit of life to us. I forgave him, then he died.

Our home always had people in it, but I was a desperate, lonely, deceitful, and a pity full little girl. No one really knew where I was at, or how to help me. We attended church regularly, read to God, and told God and each other what we thought we should to keep the family boat from rocking. We were religious and deceitful. I watched the adults hold bitterness and offenses in their hearts, and I imitated them well, as children do. Jim had no idea how to deal with his anger, and he lit one Camel filterless cigarette after another. He was constantly irritated, and I was always feeling rejected. We cared mainly for how we were all being affected selfishly by each other, and we didn't have answers to help one another, and we didn't care that we didn't care!! The emphasis was trying not to be part of the problem because there was emotional abuse and abandonment to pay if you were part of the problem. It was life without Jesus, life without passion and love, but we went to church every Sunday.

I seemed to expose much of the emotional and spiritual things that we were hiding. So many parents excuse themselves and accuse their children. Not much was learned in our suffering, and I knew I would be doomed to repeat my parents mistakes if I didn't look to Jesus for help. I didn't talk about what was going on inside me. Being open and honest with love and faith, wasn't part of the game plan. There was an atmosphere of fear especially regarding Jesus having the provision to meet our material needs. I always felt it was a hardship for my parents to provide for me and I transferred this into my relationship and beliefs about Jesus. My brother taught me to steal, and fear and torment were normal to me. I've found that those who don’t have faith for Jesus to satisfy their needs, will always steal in one form or another, even if it's affection that's not right.

When I was eight years old, I went to see the movie Bambi with my older sisters. I went into the bathroom during the movie, and a man held me at gun point, took me upstairs to sexually molest me. He told me he would kill me if I screamed. I had no idea what sex was. He pulled down his pants and I ran down the stairs, expecting to get shot in the back. I was taken to the hospital, then I spent the next two days looking at mug shots of molesters in the police department. I think that is when fear and torment became normal to me. Its as if thinking its normal to be in a concentration camp. Its like having a bad guy living with you in your house that everyone is indifferent towards, and familiar with.

When I was 13, I thought all the family problems were because of me, so I ran away from home. I was convinced I wasn't worthy of my stepfathers love. I was looking for love in all the wrong places. I dated older men. I was looking for the comfort of a father that little girls long for, and when they don't receive it, they often look some where else for it. I didn't know the comfort of my Father in Heaven or on the earth. Ezekiel 16 puts it this way she wasn't swaddled, clothed, or washed, (emotionally and spiritually). I was a lost, rebellious little girl with no one to give me the correction of The Spirit. They weren't led by The Spirit of Jesus.

We had a form of religious peace, but it was not Gods peace, the peace that comes from having honest, open, sincere, and humble relationships with one another. We told each other what we wanted to hear, to keep the artificial peace. We went to church and read to God, because we thought it to be the right thing to do. We fulfilled outward obligations and duties, birthday cards, presents, and the observation of special days. We didn't know how to deal with bitter, critical, offended thoughts with each other, so the special days, were never very special. We went to church but we had life without Gods help to deal with the divisions, accusations and evil-imaginations in our hearts. No one knew how to fight the good fight of faith and love, so we avoided each other, avoided the problems, and had a pleasant way of lying to each other to keep the artificial peace. I left this lonely family that I could never graft into because of pretense, at 14. I was a desolate heart looking to use men to get what I needed and letting them use me.

At 18 I met Dr. Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde, and fell in lust with him. He was cute and what I thought to be a good catholic boy. (I didn't know about the murderer and rapist who was lying dormant within his soul, waiting for the opportunity to appear.) Years later, Michael was referred to as the Ted Bundy of Colorado. Ted Bundy was a notorious serial rapist and murderer. This is when my nightmare really began.

I was working for my friends mother. She and her husband owned a large apartment complex. I had a variety of jobs that required me to retain a master key. My new found knight in shining armor, Michael, had been staying in my apartment while I was on a trip. Unknowingly to me, he had duplicated my master key. A few days after I returned from my trip, I was awakened around 4 a.m. to a very bloody scene. A woman was attacked in her bed. She had crawled from door to door leaving a bloody trail behind her, trying to get help, and seeing her blood all over the walls and ceiling, from door to door, utterly devastated me. I went to visit her in the hospital, and she was barely able to open her eyes. It was hard to believe she had survived such a hostile attack. The experience totally shook me, and I went over to my new boyfriends house to tell him about it, with no clue he had been the perpetrator! One of the detectives had said something about hairy arms, which made me think of Michael, because I had just been thinking a few days earlier about how hairy his arms were, but I totally discounted that it could have been him.

We ended up moving into a house together, and I went to work for a health food store. One night while at work in the health-food store, I got a call from my childhood friends uncle, Ron. He had been like an uncle to me too. He was a psychologist for a large corporation, and had written college psychology textbooks. I idolized him as a young teenager. His influence in my life caused me to believe I could find answers in psychology. I subscribed to Psychology Today, and other magazines that were similar. As Isaiah the Prophet put it, Woe unto those who go down to Egypt for their help. That's where Ron went, and I followed in his footsteps. The help Ron got from Egypt, ended with a shocking tragedy.

Ron called to invite me to his home. I called Michael to tell him I would be going to see him across town and he said the snowfall was very heavy, and the roads were hazardous, and I should visit another time, so I didn't go. A few evenings later as Michael and I were watching the evening news. We were horrified to learn what Ron's plans were that snowy evening. He had invited not only me, but my friend Lori, and Ron's three children. His son was the only one who showed up. He was quite larger than Ron, but Ron managed to beat his son to death with a lamp. He then drove to Las Vegas, got into the bathtub, slit his wrists and committed suicide.

Incidents like these often make me wonder how many times the angels of God have guarded and protected us. I'm sure we'll all be shocked to see how busy we have kept them. I used to stroll around parks at night, lost, lonely and confused, parks where women are raped and murdered on a regular basis. I was afraid of things I shouldn't have been, and not afraid of things I should have been.

After four months of living with Michael, we married. We had the permission of the state, the Catholic, and Episcopal churches, who both gave us premarital counseling! Too bad they never suggested we turn from our godless, independent ways. They never even suggested we were serving ourselves, not Jesus. The words sin, and fornication weren't mentioned. We were happy doing our own thing, and we thought it made Jesus happy too. We cared little about Jesus anyway back then. We were doing our own thing and just expected God to put His stamp of approval on it, just as the state and church did. We never consulted with the inventor and ORDAINER of marriage. We were doing our own thing our own way. The church and state blessed us, and sent us on our way.

Neither Michael or I were facing the truth about ourselves. We watched soap-opera s and night sit coms to avoid our life's problems. We lived life deceiving and being deceived. Looking back, I knew something was wrong, but I had no idea what it felt like to live in honest, open relationships. We didn't see how wrong it was to live life without a relationship with the one who created us, the one who has the blueprint to help us fulfill the master plan of our life. I was unfamiliar with the still small voice of Gods Holy Spirit I ignored what I knew to be right, by joining myself and submitting to a man of deceit. I obeyed my senses and lust, and selfish desires, and I reaped it in the relationship I chose. God was not mocked, what I sowed, is what I reaped. It took years for me to see my ways were not Gods ways, I was sowing to my flesh, and reaping corruption. I know now I have to sow to the Spirit, to reap LIFE in Jesus.

Two months into my marriage, I became pregnant with our first daughter. Two weeks before my due date I had a dream Michael had killed someone. In horror I woke up so distressed I went into labor. He had come home late from work with his pants wet. He was drunk. I remembered as I folded clothes, and watched the evening news that a story came on about a girl raped and murdered close by. It never dawned on me that was why he had come home with wet pants. I remember feeling afraid that someone in our neighborhood was murdered. Little did I know I was living with the murderer. I knew he was mean and lied, and drank too much. I called myself married, but felt so alone. I vowed until death do we part, but I couldn't attach to him because of his dark, secret life. I had never really had anyone to attach to before, that loneliness that always haunted me was still ever present. I had my own compulsive problems, my own destructive comforts.

There were things I turned to because I didn't know the peace and comfort of God, mainly overeating. I joined Overeaters Anonymous. I remember coming face to face with my bad attitudes about God, and I blurted out a prayer: God, if you're real, please show me. The next few months I started having a perception of evil. I could sense the darkness around me as never before.

I visited a neighborhood church. Many of the women were involved in Alcoholics Anonymous. I began thinking Michael might be an alcoholic. He was always lying, drinking, and he had a definite dark force around him. I ended up leaving him to help him face his problem. Two weeks later, he came to talk to me. He confessed his drinking problem along with criminal offenses he was responsible for. He told me about the infidelities he had committed. Late into the night, he told me he had done things God could not forgive him for. I said well what did you do, kill someone? In his silence and failure to respond, he was sending me a loud message. Yes, he had killed someone. I quietly left the room. My body was shaking and trembling. For the first time in my life I sensed a good whiff of hell. I was seeing the reality of heaven and hell, right before my eyes. I knew then, God was real, the devil was real, there was evil and good and I knew which side of the fence I wanted to be on! I walked and jogged around the neighborhood until the sun came up and I came upon the little church I had been attending. The priests were having an early morning meeting. They saw the horror on my face and sat me down to talk. I told them Michael had confessed to murder, attempted murder, kidnapping, brutal beatings, rape, and a whole string of crimes. I thought I was going to have a heart attack right there. I was 3 months pregnant and I started having a miscarriage.

We called Michael and had him come over to the church. He evasively confessed his sins. They told him he was an alcoholic, and he should stop drinking. They told him to go and sin no more, his sins were forgiven. Through the years, even though we spoke with many priests, pastors, and counselors, none of them ever suggested he turn himself in, or repent to those he had harmed. We began to faithfully attend AA. We learned about Michael's disease. The truth is his disease was because he was holding the love of sin his heart, and was demonized. He was given over to demonic spirits by his own will and lustful desires. We prayed regularly, but Ps.66:18 says when you hold the love of sin in your heart, God wont hear you when you pray! I don't think our prayers were going very far. We had surrounded ourselves with people who made many excuses for our sins, because they wanted excuses for their own sins. We got involved with self-improvement Christian programs. I talked to Priest after Priest, person after person. I knew we were really missing something, and things weren't right. The still small voice of God wasn't letting me be content in my false peace.

I rode the bus downtown to the library one day with our 9 month old baby. I looked through old papers, scanned micro film for hours, and could find nothing. Somehow, I thought if I could come up with any specific information about certain crimes, I could go to the authorities. What about the mother of the woman he murdered? It seemed only right that he should tell her he was sorry and had a drinking problem, a disease like AA. Was telling us he had. I know now calling his sin a disease was a sorry excuse for his lack of love for Jesus. He loved to commit crimes, and loved to think about committing crimes. That's what no one was willing to be honest about. Looking back now, years after the fact, it shocks me to think of all the professionals we consulted, and that no one ever suggested to him he could get relief for his guilty conscience if he would turn himself in.....if you confess and forsake your sin, you will find mercy!

We psychoanalyzed our past. We went to all kinds of therapy and counseling. We were hypnotized, we visualized Jesus, meditated, went through all our past memories pretending and acting out things that didn't really happen. I read many books, and believed he would be all right if he didn't drink. We blamed father, mother, sister, brother, the catholic church, the nuns, childhood events, anything to shift responsibility towards someone else. We accused others and excused ourselves, and of course the devil made me do it seemed like the best of excuses. I searched and psychoanalyzed him for years to find answers for why men lust and rape. (They lust and rape, because that's what they want to do!) My oldest sister gave me a book called Inside The Criminal Mind. That was when the dark things really began coming into the light. Jesus said it's my FOOD to do the will of Him who sent me. I started seeing it was Michael's food to commit, and think about committing crimes.

We attended church, counseling, A.A. regularly. All was looking well on the outside, But deep within, there was a big disturbance in the force. We had two more children over the next few years. I was awakened by a loud banging at the door one night, our third child was just a few months old. Michael had a late night job at a convenience store, and I assumed he had just gotten home. I heard him yell at me, bring me a towel, from the living room. At the door was a young woman who lived across the street. She said she had been raped by a Hispanic man. We called 911, and when the police arrived, she proceeded to tell the account of her attack. I remember feeling numb inside as I sensed the still small voice of God telling me something was wrong. I couldn't go back to sleep. That morning I went to see one of the priests who had counseled us. I told him I couldn't live with Michael, because every time I heard of a rape, I feared it was him. I came away from my session with the priests words ringing in my ears, Why can't you forgive, forget, and move on with things in your life? I just assumed all was my fault and I was being paranoid over nothing.

We even started getting secular counseling (they could, and should have turned him in), and Michael always had a way of shedding a bad light on me to get the heat off himself. As the days went on I felt in my heart Michael had raped the women across the street. I even went to help her move out of her house and ask her more questions, to see if I could put my suspicions to rest. He was such a good criminal, and did such sneaky things to discredit the crime scene towards looking to him as the criminal, things like wearing size 14 boots, when he really wore size 12. The girl he raped said the rapist didn't speak English, so I thought I was just unable to cope with the past. The clergy recommended biofeedback, transcendental meditation and hypnosis to help me deal with my fear and stress. We also had a fire in our home shortly after that, so I put the incident on the back burner.

Another home, another baby later, another disturbing incident to shake the false peace we lived in. Michael's business partner came over one morning and announced his next door neighbor had been raped. I had noticed Michael lusting after her before. (He had a really sneaky way of moving his eyes around without moving his head.) Some women fail to see the messages they give men by the way they dress. Men justify acting like dogs when women dress seductively, not that they are justified. Anyway, deep in my heart, I wondered if Michael had done it. After asking him a few questions, he turned the light on his partner. He told me what a bad problem with lust the guy had, and how he was trying to help him by sharing his testimony with him. I swallowed it, hook, line, and sinker. He always knew what to say.

I still felt as if I lived in a prison with him. I asked Jesus to show me what was wrong. I couldn't attach to him. We were indifferent to each other. I had 4 small children to keep me busy and he was busy with his contracting business. Neither of us had EVER been familiar with close, open, honest, accountable relationships in our lives, so it was life as usual. His actions spoke volumes to me. He said he loved me, but he behaved as if the kids and I weren't there most of the time. We looked like the struggling religious family on the outside, but I knew in my heart something was missing on the inside. One day I told him to tell me the truth, because his actions did anyway. Our marriage was a facade, and our religion together was hypocrisy. He had a form of seeking God to try to pacify me, but he didn't seek the truth out of his own spiritual hunger. We lived in private little worlds apart from each other, calling ourselves married, with no spirit of marriage.

In the church we attended, I learned a crafty way of praying. The underlying message I heard was, "I can control God through my prayers, and He will control you." It's a very subtle form of witchcraft, and it just about shipwrecked my faith. I recited prayers with the belief that if I filled in a certain persons name on the dotted line, God would be obligated to control them. "If you pray it, God is obligated to yield to your prayer." I didn't realize that God doesn't work through control and manipulation because of our prayers,I really didn't know the Lord. He does however, work through influence and persuasion. We don't just automatically have authority over people, places, and things, because of our prayers. This kind of teaching was very devastating to me. I thought Jesus didn't love me anymore when He wouldn't "control" Michael into obeying Him. I had a real "Burger King" mentality of Jesus, (Give me things my way and I'll love and serve You). I wasn't living for God, and His Kingdom, Jesus or His people and purposes. I lived for My thoughts, My ways, my kingdom, and my world, but declared myself to be a Christian. I served The Jesus of my imagination, not the Jesus in the Bible!

A year later a miracle was about to take place. Michael came home with a hurt ankle. I didn't watch much TV or read newspapers, so I wasn't aware of an attempted rape that had occurred in our area. The next day, Michael hadn't gone to church with me. I came home to find him crying (which is very unusual for a prideful man). I went to nap for a few minutes and found myself in a half awake, half asleep state of dreaming. I saw myself in a big open field with a wooden cross about ten feet tall in front of me, and many large, filled trash bags behind me. I heard a voice say, "Pick up those nails and hammer, and nail those trash bags on that cross." As I began to nail them on, the cross began to grow. The next thing I knew, I was looking down on the planet earth, floating above it. The cross had outgrown the planet.

During some of my darkest hours, I saw how I limited God through my ignorance and lack of faith. The following day, I went to a women's Christian Luncheon, and upon returning home, I found a note on the door from a local sheriff. He called when Michael got home. I just assumed he wanted some contracting work done. Michael proceeded to tell me some off-the-wall story (which most of the time I bought). This time however, I didn't believe a word he said. I had a sense, that he had hurt someone.

Just as Jesus had opened my eyes to "perceive" evil seven years earlier, I perceived Michael was lying! (I had also recently asked Jesus to open my eyes to see.) I believe when we pray in honesty, sincerely with faith regarding ourselves He will hear our cry. After Michael finished his long, tedious, deceitful, story, I looked him straight in the eyes and said, "I'm sorry you haven't gotten the help you need." He went from being well composed, to shaking and trembling. He told me that he had a problem, which had nothing to do with me and ran out the door. I went to the neighbors house. They didn't get the paper, and they had no TV. I told the woman I thought Michael had hurt someone. She mentioned receiving a call to pray for a woman who was sunbathing in the nude, and someone had tried to rape her. The man fled when the woman cried out "Jesus, help me." When she said the assailant had jumped off a cliff and ran off, I put two and two together, about why Michael had come home limping. After speaking with my friends, we decided to call the police.

I was in a state of total shock. It's not every day, well maybe it does happen frequently, that a woman picks up the phone to end her life as she knows it, to turn her husband in. It was hard for me to believe a man would choose to act that way, totally disregarding any love or respect for his wife and children. I was panic stricken with fear. The world as I knew it had just come crashing down, and I had little faith Jesus could help me pick up the pieces.

Michael came back home. I was ready to give up the "he has a disease" philosophy. The "devil made him do it," seemed a bit too evasive to swallow anymore. He was making bad choices, and we had tried all kinds of "therapy's," and he was still choosing to make bad choices. The psalmist put it this way, "they eat the bread of wickedness, they drink the wine of violence, and they don't sleep until they do evil. They make haste to shed innocent blood. " I tried everything but turning him in. For years I was advised that I didn't have enough information, but nothing had successfully stopped him from hurting others. I knew he needed to be stopped, no matter what the cost. I knew my life would be in danger for calling the police, but I didn't care. The Lord put a resolve in my heart that I was not going to allow anyone to cause me to deny any longer. When Michael walked in the house, he took one look at me and knew what I had done. He read me like a book, and the "spirit of murder" was glaring in his eyes. He had a wicked way of staying in control of me. There was an eerie silent voice that screamed "Do what I say, don't cross my will or I'll kill you." You couldn't hear the words, but you could feel them in the air. I said to Michael, "If you loved me and you had done all you could to help me stop hurting people, and I didn't stop, what would you do? "

He stared at me with his murderous eyes, while I prayed silently for Jesus to protect the kids and me. I knew he was very unstable, and he ran out of the house in a rage. I knew an emotional volcano was about to erupt. I wasn't sure where he was going or what he would do, but I knew a miracle had taken place. Jesus promises to bring the hidden things of darkness to the light. He said there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed. For the first time since meeting Michael, I saw clearly his deceit and wickedness. I saw it was his "food" to do evil.