No Condemnation | Previous Challenge Entry

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TITLE: No Condemnation | Previous Challenge Entry
By Deborah Sampson
01/16/13
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Sometimes you hear something from your past that brings to remembrance of not so good of a time.

Addison just told her boss that she didn’t want to continue as a shift leader. She thought about it and did not think that the twenty-five cents an hour raise was enough to do all that was required of the job.

“Addison, you have been here long enough now to want to step up and take a higher position. There could be more advantages later. Girl, you are going to have to measure up or people will pass you by.” John continued to look at her as he shut her file. “You need to go home and think about it. Give me your final answer tomorrow.”

Addison felt relief as she stepped out of the office. Here she was eighteen years old and still living at home. Those words John had just said made her flinch. Her dad always used that same saying ‘you’d better measure up’. He said it in the school work, any sports they might have played. The chores he delegated out, nothing was ever good enough or done to his standards. She was the second of four children and was expected to earn money so her brother Joshua could go to college. It wasn’t expected that the girls in the family would go.

Mom never interfered with what Dad told his kids, she never sided with them. In talking among themselves, they had come to the conclusion that he did the same thing to their mother. He knew that if mom would try she could measure up to his standards eventually.

This was normal in this house at least until Addison started going to church. The time spent in God’s house, opened up a whole new world to her. One that did not condemn her.

God loved her, His free gift of salvation made it clear to Addison that upon asking Jesus into her heart guaranteed her a future of not having to ‘measure up’ to anyone’s standards except the Lord’s. She did not need to feel less about herself as her father suggested or her boss at work.

They were trying to make a person do as they deemed fit. They were in the position to overlook someone because they had that power because of their job title as in manager, or even Dad. They were using it while thinking of themselves, it was wrong! They were basically using the person for personal gain, be it a job or her dad in running of his home.

Couldn’t at least Dad see what he was doing in his home? The tension caused by this?

Upon arriving home, Dad met her at the door. Addison, your mother has left us, said she wouldn’t be back; she couldn’t take the dictatorship or the lack of compassion anymore. What do you make of this?

Addison saw the pain in her father’s eyes; he really did not know why mom left.
“Dad, let’s set down, please.” Addison began to explain the whole situation including her job, and then what she had learned about God. How she felt so different, how she knew that having Jesus in her heart meant more to her than words could say.

“Addison, I have been so wrong, I just wanted the best for all of us, I didn’t mean to destroy us, I need to go talk to your Pastor, I need answers and maybe I can correct this mess with God’s help. I only pray that I can.”

That was about three years ago, Dad gave his heart to the Lord, after that things started changing in our home, and in fact Mom and Dad have worked out their problems and she is back home. Joshua got to go to college. Molly and David the twins, have it really good now, they are entering their senior year this fall.

It’s amazing to see what has taken place in her family; with God in control all things are possible. Addison would like to say that her boss, John changed too, but not so. Addison gave her decision that next day, and she told him that she would not be staying there.
Two weeks later she had a job in an insurance office, one where she was appreciated for her hard work.

Addison met Landon Miles, and soon they would be getting married, so much had changed in her life, but God’s constant love and guidance have not.

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