Somewhere along the way my maternal grandmother got radically saved and moved from one end of the spiritual spectrum to the other. She abandoned her depraved life and began living wholeheartedly for God. She married a godly man who would become instrumental in my conversion many years later.

My family considered my grandmother a religious fanatic as she continually quoted the Bible. The conviction of her words was overpowering to my parents, who lived in a world of deceit. Our deception caused us all to be thankful that she lived a thousand miles away. My grandparents would occasionally visit, and one summer I developed a very special relationship with my grandfather, Neil. He was a gentle soul with great wisdom, love, and a soft spot for his only granddaughter. He hugged me a lot and often told me that he loved me. He would frequently talk about the Lord, but in a nonabrasive manner, sharing stories that gave me the impression that he really knew Jesus.

When I was twelve years old, my father trusted Christ as his Savior and began taking the family to church. The abuse stopped, and my father began spending time at home playing games with the family and reading the Bible. We went to church as a family, spending time with other Christians and even sharing dinner several times at the pastor’s home. Although I hadn’t made a personal commitment to Christ, I saw the change in my father’s life, and it was a testimony to God’s saving power. My father disappeared six months later on a three-week drinking binge. When he returned home, he cursed the church, Christians, and God. As I lay in my bedroom sobbing, I could hear him insisting that it had all been an act, that he never really meant anything that he had said or done. The abuse resumed. Shortly thereafter, I attempted suicide for the first time.

After the first attempt I found other ways to hide my pain with drugs, alcohol, sex, and the occult. A couple of months later I watched helplessly as my father, in a drunken rage, raped my mother. In pain, I rebelled at every opportunity, picking fights—both verbally and physically—with my father.

From there I wholeheartedly threw myself into the arms of the world, further entangling myself in the web of its deception. Self-defeating behavior ruled my life until, at twenty years of age, I found myself sitting in a prison cell serving a six-month sentence. I was divorced with two children, and, worst of all, I had no hope. I had tried to commit suicide multiple times in an attempt to end the pain in which I was drowning. While I was in jail several churches sent ministry teams to minister to the inmates, but I rejected them along with the message of hope that they offered.

When I left prison I moved to California to go to school and to make something of my life. During my years there, my grandfather, who was so influential in my preteen years, died. When I heard that he was dying of cancer, I drove more than 200 miles to sit at his bedside. As I wept uncontrollably, he promised me that he’d see me again someday in heaven. While I nodded my head in agreement, I had no concept of salvation and certainly no hope of going to heaven. But he was a praying grandfather, and God had promised him that he and his household would be saved—including that rebellious little girl in a grown-up body, the one who hated and blamed God for all her problems.

After completing my education, I moved to Nashville, Tennessee, to pursue a career in counseling and music publishing. I began counseling for the YWCA in a home for troubled girls. I was twenty-four years old, and for the first time in my life I was on my own, functioning in a relatively healthy manner. But I was still dissatisfied. I have always loved to exercise, and at that time I regularly ran three miles a day. My apartment was in a high-rise complex located downtown and sandwiched between shops and businesses. One day as I ran I reflected on how far I’d traveled in my short life. I thought I was happy … but was I?

“You should be,” I told myself as I ran, dodging businessmen in suits. “You have everything you’ve ever wanted—your own home, a career, and money in the bank. What more could you want?” I quickly dismissed my feelings of dissatisfaction as ungratefulness, and I looked for a more positive thought to ponder. I laughed as Psalm 23, which I had memorized as a young girl, popped into my head. Nevertheless, I thought, it’s better to reflect on those verses than on my past. I nonchalantly repeated the oft-spoken verse as I ran. “The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want.” I crossed a busy street, pausing for a brief moment, and then continued. “He maketh me to lie down in green pastures.” I saw my apartment building in the distance and picked up the pace of both my running and my words. “He leadeth me beside the still waters.”