Issue link: http://lawtonfirst.uberflip.com/i/1263026
17 spring/summer 2020 and stop being tossed by my emotions and be grounded in Him, letting my roots grow deep into Him and draw up nourishment for the journey. Trusting an unseen God with my son was difficult, and the urge to take things into my own hands was a hard-fought private battle. I started attending a class at Lawton First Assembly taught by a spiritual giant (in my eyes, anyway). His name is Jay Cox. He spoke God's word, prayed God's word, lived God's word, and his firm foundation was on God's word. That's what I needed in my life – that kind of unshakable faith. One morning in class, I got an overwhelming presence of the Holy Spirit urging me to ask Jay to pray for the situation with my son. After class, I did just that. After the prayer, Jay looked at me and said, "When you leave here today, don't speak against the prayer of agreement we just prayed, no matter what the enemy might say to you." My response was, "Yes, Sir." And that's what I needed to spur me on. That prayer gave me much needed encouragement. From that point on there was no more being tossed by my emotions or letting the enemy jerk me around in my mind with hate-filled words. While searching scripture, God led me to Malachi 4:6 (NIV), which says, "He will turn the hearts of the parents to their children, and the hearts of the children to their parents." Woohoo! It's coming, and it's coming soon; I just knew it deep within my spirit. The battle was over. My faith soared, and a peace that I had never experienced before swept over me, and all of the fear the enemy had used during this seven-year season disintegrated with the words I had just read – He will turn our hearts back to each other. With this victory, I still had a lot of waiting ahead, but the battle was over. It's hard to explain, but there was an inner knowledge that the worst was over. Pastor Don Barnes always says, "you just know in your knower." At that time, I still had two more years of waiting ahead of me, but it was the most peaceful and pleasant two years I had had since this painful journey had begun. S u d d e n l y , o u t o f n o w h e r e . Then in October of 2018, my phone rang, and on the other end was my son. He said, "Mom, will you and Dad come visit us?" My heart was beating out of my chest. It was happening; it was truly happening. All the prayers, all the tears, all the birthdays, and all the holidays without him and his family were coming to an end. Within three days, our plans were in place–my husband and I would drive to South Carolina. I had a couple of weeks to fast and pray before we left, and the enemy tried his very best to rear his ugly head during my time of fasting and praying. I got violently sick with a stomach bug the day before we were to leave, and Hurricane Michael was predicted to hit the very same time we were to be traveling. My husband was very concerned about the weather, but I said that nothing was going to stop God's plans or this reunion. We hit the road at 4 a.m., and by 6 p.m. that evening we were in the thick of the storm. We were traveling on unfamiliar roads in the dark with unrelenting rain like I've never seen before. We stopped to get a room, but there were no vacancies because everyone on the coastline had moved inland. We felt a little like Joseph and Mary with no room at the inn, so we kept traveling through the unrelenting storm. I was freaking out, and fear gripped every part of me. I told my husband to just pull over, stop driving, but he said that we were going to keep going, slowly but surely. We felt just like the disciples must have felt when they were in the storm; we were afraid we were going to drown. The Holy Spirit spoke to me during the storm and said, "Sometimes you have to go through a storm to get to the promise." He had promised to restore all the enemy had stolen. We made it to a hotel around midnight, and we were both exhausted from the journey, in more ways than one. This definitely wasn't the way I imagined our reunion to be, but it didn't surprise God at all. We awoke early the next morning and started driving. We were just a couple of hours from our son and his family. My heart was overwhelmed as we drove, and I was nervous. I had waited so long for this. There are no words to describe how thankful I was for the journey. "You are a Good, Good Father and your promises are Yes and Amen. You redeem and restore so beautifully." The visit with our son was saturated in peace and love, and we even stayed an extra day. Friends, I hope that my personal story of restoration will bring you encouragement and hope, no matter what you're facing. Hope never fails! ■ Sandra Fehring has been married to her husband,Larry, for 33 years. They have three grown children and six grandkids. Sandra is an active member of LFA. She is part of the Girlfriends Women's Ministry leadership team, and a Wednesday-night 4th grade, small group leader. She has been the Pastoral Staff Childcare provider at LFA since October 2013, and she has also been active with the nursing home and shut-in visitation team.