Mrs.Oz (Alicia)'s Testimony

The first way God stepped into my life was to break the chain of my heritage. He saved me from being raised by my alcoholic father. Later my bio-dad said he was more married to Jack Daniel's than to my mom...so that gives you an idea. He eventually drank himself into stomach cancer and had to have his whole insides rerouted. So, though I eventually got to talk to him and it was a sweet reunion of a few years of calling and writing before his sudden death in 2006, God showed me love by plucking me out and letting my mom meet a very Godly man to marry when I was 5.
I remember getting ready to do down to the altar. I was 6 (born in 1976) so it had to be the end of '81 or in '82. I lived in southern Indiana at the time and the bible belt way of doing things was that you gave an altar call after every sermon. I have a vivid memory of standing at the end of my pew and looking down the sloping walkway that led to the altar. I think I even remember the preacher bending down and talking to me as I bowed my head.
Still, I went on from there riding the heels of my parents faith. God used that to teach me his ways and my dad was blessed with a love for wisdom so he stressed that in my upbringing. Proverbs was always in his conversation in my guidance. However, my folks also went through some very strange Christian movements in my growing up years that have led me backtracking to clean up my theology a bit. The major one was legalism. I think this was really what halted and nearly destroyed my faith because it went against my random and spontaneous personality. Thankfully, God sustained me and protected me through this time and was not content to let me think that was all there was to Him.
I was 15 when I went on my second Teen Missions trip to Russia. Our team went from Moscow to Khabarovsk on the eastern edge. We rode the Siberian Express from town to town to do evangelistic mime dramas. We were at the time in Irkutsk on the border of Mongolia. It was about halfway through our trip. Now, before this I had only been to Honduras and although it had made an impact on me, I was in a very selfish mode of my life and did not absorb as well the impact of the trip. But, here, in Russia, going from town to town and now being in one of the biggest towns we had been in and hearing the horror stories of the churches when they took their stand in the dark times years before, I was overwhelmed. Stories of raids on churches and the men being taken out and shot right in front of their wives and children. It shook me up. The faith I had claimed to have since childhood began to run through a test of it's validity in my mind. There could only be one solution, either it was real or it was not and if it was not, I was not wanting to lay my life down like that. Yet if it was real, I was not laying my life down enough for it now.
We stayed in churches. There were about 35 of us: boys, girls and leaders. Usually we stayed in the church on the floor of their sanctuary with a row of chairs to divide the boys and the girls. This night in Irkutsk, we had the girls below and the boys in the balcony above. It was a big church with lots of windows. I had been desperate to be off the ground so I put together eight chairs facing each other in rows of four to try to make a "bed". It was uncomfortable and I don't sleep well with light so I was restless and thinking a lot. It was still bright daylight because it stays light till after 10 pm there in the summer. I sat up and EVERYONE was sound asleep around me. Somehow in a room with 35 other people I sat and had an intimate moment with my Creator. I began to pray, and I prayed and I prayed and for the first time in my life I was delighted to pray. I realized for the first time that I needed God for my sin and that my parents faith didn't cover that. God became real to me that night and He became my treasure.
I went on growing up and had a few minor bumps (more like distractions) from this mountain top experience but my life was different after that. I began to pray about what my calling was, who I was to be faithful to until I married him etc. My heart was bent on His will as a delight rather than my programed and learned religion.
I got married at 20 and had my honeymoon baby days after turning 21 in 1997. I was a young mom and my life was different from there on out. God used parenting to keep me growing in my faith. I went through a really tough faith spot when the church I had grown up in went through an ugly split and we simultaneously had our second baby girl who had major colic. I had some real dark days but God was faithful. We got plugged back into a bible teaching church when she was six months old and my faith began to grow again.
In 2002 I was 20 weeks along with our baby boy when I began to labor and dilate. I was put on bed rest for the rest of the pregnancy. This was a sweet time between me and my Lord but a hard time on my family. My husband had to truck the girls (then almost 5 and almost 2) off to different families in our church all day because I was not to be up doing for them what they needed. It led to a hard time in our marriage as well as keeping the pregnancy became the focus of our lives and existence. God did some painful stretching of our faith in those times. I learned more fully how to trust him with my precious son's life growing inside me. I also knew that I could be in for an unhealthy birth and possibly disabled child. My husband and i both grew up with disabled siblings so I dealt with fears of that happening. God held my hand the whole way and I learned what it really felt like to trust.
Then there were some good years. Yeah! A healthy baby boy (though an awful birth story, but HE was okay!) and two beautiful girls. We went on with life and homeschooling and all the simple joys of young family life.
It was in this time that I got brave enough to reconnect with my bio-dad. It upset my mom and dad very much and that was very hard. I knew God was convicting me though to forgive and I wanted this man to know I forgave him. It turned out to be a blessing for me as we had about 2 years of some words and catching up. He had come to the Lord but was very much a baby Christian. We had some great conversations about life and God and I still thank the Lord for giving me that gift of time.
Then came the biggest moment of my growth in Christ and the catalyst into a whole different understanding of God and the Gospel than I had ever had before. In June of 2006 my dad, just about to turn 54, was diagnosed with adenocarcinoma. A very aggressive cancer in his stomach. It was at stage 4 and there was little hope. They thought they could take out the stomach but when they got in to do the surgery, he was peppered all over the abdomen with it as well. The next year was the most grueling of my existence. His body was strong except for the caner and that only made it take him down to the very end of himself. I thought a lot of Job in these days. In the end he could not speak and then he could not look at us and open his eyes. Not being able to eat made him literally starve to death as well and watching that happen took me to the bottom of myself. Yet, in that time God stepped in and showed me new things about him that allowed me to have the best and truest conversations with my dad I had ever had. We only talked about deep stuff really because the temporal stuff became so meaningless. His faith was strong but he was SO sad to leave us and especially, it broke his heart to leave his only grandchildren who were then 3, 5 and 8. He had never had a son and my brother, having cerebral palsy (and though he loved him dearly and did all kinds of stuff with him) could not do the son sort of things a boy can usually do. So, us having a boy gave him so many excited plans for the future and he would talk about them. Then God said "no" and it was crushing.
I began to read Randy Alcorn's book "Heaven" and learned things I'd somehow missed in my Christian upbringing. I never knew God planned on making a new actual earth! There are lots of things I did not know. So, we would read together and talk together and talk about eternity. It was hard but so precious to me. My dad went to be with the Lord in May 15, 2007.
Then I was caught up for the next two years being there for my mom. She had a very hard time. The realization of the joy of eternity to come fed my spirit though this time like nothing I can describe. (In this time of my dad's illness, my bio-dad was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease and died in 2006. I never got to meet him) I felt I could handle anything knowing what God had in mind for those who loved him. It gave me strength I needed to give back to my mom and homeschool my children.
Then, God called us into the public school and that is a whole different and amazing testimony. I won't bother you with here. He grew my faith so much through that time and finished cutting some ties I still had to the ways of legalism. I'm so grateful for that because it has taught me to be open to his will above my own and to seek his will above the opinion of others.
The last and most recent testimony of my walk I will try to keep short. God seemed to not be willing to let me rest with my delight and strength coming from the hope of his promises eternally. He has began to work on me now to teach me to get my enjoyment straight from Him. His gifts are amazing and they are to be felt and appreciated and anticipated but He is teaching me that He wants me to be emptied out of all but himself. I'm learning I have to stop trying to control situations and people. I'm learning the blessing of my being humbled. He is teaching me the obsession he wants me to have with Him. As if eternity was not enough and the delight it filled my heart with realizing it, He has even more for me!
A big part of a testimony is seeing where God has taken you. The further I go, the greater the delights become and all I can say is that if it gets better, you better believe I'm delighted to walk on and when I die, please play the Newsboys song "In Christ Alone" cause that is all I am or want to be.

"You will guide me with Your counsel, And afterward receive me to glory. Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is none upon earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart fail; But God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."