98. Cheryl: From No God To Know God

 Cheryl was raised in an atheist, humanist and politically charged home which supernaturally shaped her life into a follower and lover of Jesus. Growing up, Cheryl's knowledge of God meant there was/is no God but through some difficult life situations, it was God's love and plan for Cheryl, shown through divine connections and friendships, where God got a hold of her heart. If you are struggling to know who the living God is, be encouraged by listening to Cheryl's testimony. In this episode, you will hear Cheryl's faith journey of 'No God' to Knowing God and how He has been faithful since. 

Transcript

EP98 Cheryl

[00:00:00] Jesus in my life episode 98 Earl would choke me and I never thought anything per se about it because I used to think like it Wasn't punching me. There were no black and blue bruises and thankfully I was going to a Christian counselor who said, you know You could die from choking, but that isn't even what got me to leave him

Welcome to Jesus in my life a podcast with Robin Jack where we interview everyday people like me and you about their Extraordinary experiences with our Savior Jesus Christ Welcome to another episode of Jesus in my life podcast. This is your host Jack with my ghost Rob. Hey everybody so glad to be with you today and Jack, today's episode, let's go.

I'm really excited. Yeah, let's go. This one's going to be a wild one. Yeah, it's a wild one for sure. Well, not necessarily wild like everybody's thinking wild, but it [00:01:00] is not the normal American life story. Yeah. Let's put it that way. We have on the show today, Cheryl, a good friend from our congregation. She is very artistic and we love her for that.

Cheryl was born into a family. That was part of the Socialist Communist, um, Party. And, it, they were hardcore Communist Socialists. And, this is during the Civil Rights Movement. And, uh, your mom, in fact, was the first person of color to play in the Philharmonic Symphony. Is that correct? Orchestra yeah, so you know pretty important person in history in our country.

Your brother had a documentary made of him is he's an artist named Toth and that's Thoth. Thoth. Apple Thoth. Thoth. Yes. And that documentary actually won the 2001 Academy Award for short Short. Yeah, [00:02:00] I know and he got to go on stage with Samuel Jackson. I just loved watching it. Wow. How cool is that?

That's my brother. Yeah. Anyway, not me. So Cheryl, thank you for coming on and welcome to the show. I'm glad to be here. I'm excited. All right. So you got a lot of history to share, but let's, let's distill it down and let's go back to the beginning. Tell us a little bit about your early life. And the fact that Spoiler, God wasn't at all taught in your family.

In fact, you came from an atheist family, right? Yes, I mean, I didn't know anything else. Most of the people around me were Jewish. So, interesting thing was that my mother, My father were very involved in the civil rights. I only knew this kind of recently that my father actually was part of the march I guess he knew Martin Luther King jr.

Being a doctor. He would go and help a lot I didn't know that and then I forget what it was. He was [00:03:00] the first White man to be the head of the I forget what it was called another kind of civil rights division. That's funny I forgot to bring it. I wrote it down to remember. I didn't know any of that. I mean, I was just growing up I was a kid what I'm the youngest so my grandmother was Religious and I guess she took us to church a couple of times.

So that's the most I had no idea I remember going and we had to kneel and cross ourselves and I'm like, I don't know what all this is. And it was different. My mother, big thing was to love people. Yeah. So I couldn't say as I was growing up, I was aware. And we've that way we lived well firstly we live with my mother and father were married wherever we were living St.

Albans, New York, if anybody knows it in a very beautiful house Which I really love but they got divorced and we moved and he was Jewish And his family sat Shiva when he married [00:04:00] my mother And we didn't know his family, so, I don't know. I was taken on a peace march in Manhattan. I don't know where it was.

I had figured out a while ago what, like, in time, what particular one. And I just, we went and were part of it. So all these different things were happening. I went to this, we went to this thing, I think it was on Sundays, the Ethical Culture Humanist Society. And, you know, the adults would go have their meeting, and the kids would go kind of like church.

And they'd get a lesson, and I'm pretty sure the lesson was why God isn't real, and showing you. The only thing I remember was Burt Kessler was his name, taught, he was, whatever he did and his secretary was looking for some files she couldn't find and he found them for her. And she said, thank God, and it was him, and so, like at that time I was a little kid, so I was like, oh yeah, she should have thanked you, not God, God [00:05:00] didn't find it, you know.

And now as an adult, I look back, it's like. She probably wasn't even like it meant enough people say that it doesn't mean anything to them for real Anyhow serious enough to the atheist that's teaching atheism, right? Yeah, it was enough to correct to leave an impression on you though. Yeah, so that's the only thing I remember it I know that the foundation was there though and that it was laid that this is the way it was Russia was this wonderful place, let's take it back, the Soviet Union, just really considered way up there, Cuba, whatnot, and so, yeah, that's how I was raised.

The community, as I said, that I lived in was a community called Parkway Village, made of the United Nations delegates, people from all over the world, most of the people there I don't know if they were so much socialist, but definitely very liberal. It was just a very politically liberal community. I think it was [00:06:00] founded by, was it Gloria Friedan or whatever, one of the heavy duty feminist movement people, and that's what I grew up in.

That's what I knew. Hate was a bad word in our home. Couldn't say that, except for George Wallace. We were allowed to say we hated him. I know, but he wanted to send African American folks in crates back to Africa. So yeah, we were allowed to hate him, but you know, yeah, so that's where I learned. And when I look back, I feel like everything I was taught was really.

the foundation of Christianity, but it was denied. It was really what God says. We were to love our neighbors. You were to help people. That was the greater good. Because we're all here on this planet, and how do we get along? How do we live here without whatever? So I don't know, I ponder that when a lot of people say, they talk to an atheist, and they try to say, well, why do we want [00:07:00] to be good?

Right. And they try to show that, but to me, I kind of get it. But I guess you would have a conscience, because God gave it to you. But you are all here on this planet. Yeah, for whatever reason and wouldn't it just be better to live in harmony and maybe because musical home You know harmony is a good thing rhythm and all of that You know, it brings up an interesting point about like the fact that god did establish certain laws, right?

And if we took god out of the equation and we just lived by those laws our society Would be in a better condition than it is now, right? There's treating people like they have value Not taking what is others not take unnecessarily taking life, right? Like there's so many aspects of the law that are just simply good Good living.

Right. And my mother was, yeah, very bent on that good living and [00:08:00] people being equal and that, why should someone be making a million dollars when another person can barely eat off of what they make, you know, and that's therefore why communism and socialism. So I kind of got that. And for the longest, I would just spout whatever my mom said when we moved to California.

So I grew up in New York. That was wonderful. Got to, my mother would, had to work and work and so whatever job she could get. So she was a tympanist, but most tympanists are percussionists as well. So she would get jobs like on Broadway, and she'd be the sound effect person, she would be whatever. Her agent would grab her date book and fill it with, Whatever.

I mean, and it was fun in New York. You get to go on field trips. You get to go see the ballet and was always there. There's Cheryl's mom. I mean, it felt so great. I really enjoyed my childhood. There were some negative things. There was a man, a genius musically, but he was not a very moral man. [00:09:00] He basically once told my mom and she said, that's why they never got married.

He could have sex with anyone you could have lunch with. Which sadly meant children. So, unfortunately, I don't remember a lot. He said some very inappropriate things to me that made me uncomfortable. But my brother and sister were definitely recipients of Fred's deviant thought patterns. And I told my mom I didn't feel comfortable that he made me very uncomfortable.

And he said things that I didn't like and she told him. And I can remember that, I can remember driving down, we always had a station wagon, she had to be able to fit her drums in the station wagon. And I remember her saying, and no seatbelts, I'm roaming around in the back of the station wagon having a great time.

And suddenly she says, you know, I told Fred what you said. I just remember my heart stopping and I say this because in the sense of my relationship with my mom and how I formed, I realized then I was not safe, that she wasn't keeping me safe. I [00:10:00] don't think I could have said that, but I know due to some things that happened in which I thought, why didn't I listen to my mom?

Oh yeah, because I didn't feel safe. I didn't trust her. And I think that was the main thing. The thing was, is that Fred then went to my sister. So she didn't say which one of us said it, I guess. Because Fred went to my sister and said, Why did you tell on me? You liked the things I do. So my sister said that she didn't know I had told.

So that was something we got to talk about later in time. Anyway, um, My mom had a lot of discrimination, discriminatory things happen to her throughout her career. She'd go on tour with, probably it was the New York City Opera, and they couldn't have her seen when they went to the South. So they had to, she couldn't go into some hotels with the orchestra.

She could, you know, things like that. And a position came vacant in the New York Philharmonic. Her teacher, Saul Goodman had been [00:11:00] playing, and he left, and it turns out, anyway, it's a crazy story because it was, it came down to her and another gentleman, and one day my brother comes home and says that someone, did you know so and so got the job?

They weren't even, they never even went through the audition. And it was the tympanist from San Francisco. So it was such an opening in San Francisco, and my mom got it, and we moved to San Francisco in 1972. So that was a little different. So that whole community that I knew, which were a lot of the really tight knit community, these African American women who married these Jewish men, and we would all get together, we would have Passover's.

Like what yeah, I don't know. What is this? Yeah, I was the youngest I got to say that line that the youngest like why what I didn't know what I was saying It's so beautiful to now be a Christian though and think oh[00:12:00] 

I got a question if we can go back just a bit I would imagine that where your story is going there will be some transitions up ahead. But, but I'm curious because of the type of home that you were raised religiously or not religiously in that sense, were you encouraged to ask questions? Like you were, you were raised in a home where, you know, God's not real.

Were you in, in an environment that at least you could ask the question, say more specifically, could you ask the question, were you allowed to ask the question? It is God real? I have no idea. Cause I don't think I ever thought. I'm telling you, God's not real. You're going to the south. God's never occurred to me to ask like what my mom did encourage questioning because that's what I think one of the things that turned her off was she had a lot of questions and my grandparents were of that era you don't ask because I don't think they even knew themselves.

But they [00:13:00] definitely did not welcome questioning at all. So she wasn't getting any of her questions answered. Sadly, her moment, defining moment was when she was in high school and she started getting involved politically in someone in one of the groups because she was like, I can't come to that meeting.

I have to go home and pray. I have a test tomorrow. And he said, why are you going to go home and pray? Like, why don't you go home and study? So my mom, like a lightbulb came on, was like, oh yeah, I should go home and study. So no one was there to tell her, yeah, you go home and study, but you're still praying.

You know, she, I guess, learned rote prayers, and that was what she knew. She didn't know a relationship with God. So she came to that conclusion, got involved in the civil rights, and she raised her kids. So back to also my grandmother taking us to church twice. I guess I never heard it. I'm the youngest. My sister told me that my mother and grandmother had a big fight [00:14:00] about taking my children to church.

Which was interesting because something similar happened where my mom didn't didn't want to do something and I'm like, those are my children It's like now we're talking a slightly different thing. You know, my mom. Oh, yeah, I'm open to whatever and anybody and except religion Well, yeah major tenant of communism, right is right, right?

Oh, and she's the opiate of the people Yeah I'm getting into arguments with my friends who were Christians. I didn't have many friends that I know of. I mean, looking back now, maybe I did, but all my friends were Jewish. Sadly, most Jewish people, there was one friend who was kind of kept kosher. But for the most part, they're not religiously Jewish.

It's their culture. It's what you eat. We eat certain foods on certain times, you know. We, I celebrated when I was little, I remember celebrating Hanukkah. Because I remember spinning the dreidel, but I don't, that's about all I [00:15:00] remember about it. Lighting the candles, we did do that. So I guess it was just more a tradition thing, like some people who do Christmas.

Yeah. They don't know what they're doing. It's a cultural thing. Right. So. So. You had Christian friends though, like what age was this? Are you like in high school time or what? Well, I moved to San Francisco just after my 13th birthday. Okay. I went to one school for eighth grade. It was the public school. So also the thing to know is my mother, my brother, my sister all went to music and art.

I just assumed I would go to music and art. It's really weird because you have to audition to get in. And I don't remember if I thought I was going to get in musically or through my art. Either way, I was like, I don't know why I just assumed I would go. I did. But we moved and I couldn't. So I was kind of very disappointed about that.

So I was going to this one junior high and a team of people come from all a high school that had been all boys that was now gonna go co ed, called Lick Wilmerding High [00:16:00] School. But it was private. And I went and visited it. They didn't have music, but their art, and you had to take art and drafting, metal, wood shop, machine shop, electric.

I was just like, I want to go to this school. And I don't know, I think I got a scholarship. It was the least expensive of that time, anyway, of all the private schools. And it was wonderful. There were 200, I think, and 40 some odd students in the whole school. And I was one of very few girls because we were the first group, sadly, as someone, you know, I'm in a school, there were maybe three other African Americans, one boy who lived his whole life in a very, European community.

So they didn't know what to do with me. I mean, I didn't, I just was me. I never stopped to think, I mean, I really didn't really think that much about my skin tone or how I looked per se, used to wear my hair in four braids. It was [00:17:00] like, I don't know. I was just me and being me. And of course there was a little bit of whatever, cause everybody knew who my mother was pretty much.

And there are actually a few other children whose parents were in the symphony orchestra that went there. But that's, I think, when I would get into arguments, actually I even did in eighth grade, my poor history teacher, boy, I was really, he was, I think, in the reserves or something, and me and this other kid, we would just talk about communism, and how great communism is, and you could see the teacher's eyes would get really wide, like, no, no, that's not okay.

Anyhow, I was, I mean, in the set, I was, It wasn't anything I truly, it was just what my mom had taught me. You were a parroting. So, yes. And, you know, still in that, I love my mom and all that phase of my life. So then I did get into the high school and I'm arguing with people a little bit. A lot of times I'd hear my Jewish and Christian [00:18:00] friends arguing.

I just went, well, I think Jesus was a person, but I, I would be like, I don't know what you all are talking about. Like what? Out of curiosity, did you even know who the historical figure of Jesus was at this time? I don't think so. I mean, I watched Ben Hur. I love Charlton Heston. I would watch Ben Hur, but yeah, I don't know, and Godspell, right?

What was he? Jesus Christ, superstar, all of that kind of came out. Yeah, sure. But yeah, it didn't mean anything. I used to say to people, I don't know, what's the difference between Christianity, Protestantism, and Catholicism. And no one can answer my question, actually. It's kind of like That's kind of sad, actually.

It is! Now I know things that I know. I'm thinking, wow, that's like crazy. Because there was a Catholic church just outside. They had this really fun hill that we used to like to ride our bike down. We used to like to [00:19:00] sneak in there. It was so dark and spooky. And that's all I know is that, okay, this is spooky.

You know, it's, I had no clue. What it was. So as I said, I would listen to my Jewish and Christian friends kind of argue. And I had a friend, Debbie Adams, and Debbie was Catholic, and I just, one day she came and she said, you know, there are these people in my church and they have these meetings and they talk in this different language, and she said, I was in it, and the next thing I knew, my hands were shaking, and I, and I just knew, I knew whatever had happened to her was real.

I didn't know what it was, but it was like, I could not. Experience, right? You can't deny someone's experience. So I didn't know what it was. And this was, must've been like the charismatic movement that passed through. I think, yeah, she ended up moving to some, I don't know what happened to her, but she moved to the valley of the moon up there, Sonoma or whatever.

And. Started living [00:20:00] with some community which worried me a little bit that, you know, a lot of those communities were cults. I don't know what happened to her. So I never got to share with her the impact that what she said had on me. Because before she moved she came and she, I think she did this with all her friends, kind of basically shared her story hoping.

Yeah. But I was just kind of looking at her like, okay, yeah, whatever you say. At that time, I was like starting into this very wild period in my life, whatever. But meanwhile, a very important thing happened. So backtrack to my mom and all the things that she was involved in. So in orchestras, and this is part of how that guy was able to come in, they used to do an open audition.

So they would see who you were. And a lot of discrimination would happen. So my mother and um, two other people came up with this idea. Actually it might have been more than two. That's, they did this orchestra. But they came up with this idea of auditioning behind a screen. So that you couldn't know who it was.

And that's actually how she ended up getting the job in San Francisco. They used a [00:21:00] screen. So that worked, but she also came up with what used to happen too, was when you'd get a different conductor, like the American symphony was Leopold Sikowsky's baby. But the guest conductors would come in. Guest conductors had the right to fire.

I don't want you. I don't want you go to the union. I want somebody different. My mother never had a problem with that. She never had a conductor that didn't want her. They were all always excited when they actually saw her. I don't remember which famous conductor it was that said, yeah, he liked her cause she was so lively and he just, and her intonation and all of that.

Cause the timpanist is considered the second conductor in the orchestra. So that is very important in her rhythm. It was like impeccable. So when we moved to San Francisco, they, they started doing tenure so that conductors couldn't just come in and you'd be out of a job for the next job and what do you do?

So my mom never thought about it. She thought that was a good thing to have the [00:22:00] tenure. And then in San Francisco Symphony, it was a panel of seven men, European men. They had, each one had from one to 100 to vote. Whether she should get tenure or not. Had, so you had to have somewhere between 350 and 700.

Two of the members gave her a one. It's like, okay, at that point we're talking 1974. My mother started playing in 1949. New York Philharmonic, New York City Opera, the American Ballet, I mean just all these companies and all these conductors. How do you get a one? Yeah, exactly. I mean on one level, I mean it didn't work out.

On one level it's kind of good that at least they didn't get together and say, let's all give her 49. Or really all it would have taken was one person to give her 49 and the rest to do 50. And then she would have just been a 349 but instead she got some really low thing like 70 Yeah, and it's just like I don't even think a student would [00:23:00] get that low.

So she sued And she lost, so she sued again. And she lost again, and I just don't think she ever fully recovered. So, that was, like, my second year in high school, and by the end of high school, I couldn't wait to get out of the house. And started my first real job when Star Wars, the very first original, came out.

And worked at the movie theater, and met husband number one. And then I started college, and around there I started to think, you know, I think that there's something. Everybody believes in something bigger than themselves. I don't care what they call it. It's not everybody. There is something bigger. And these days, oh, the universe.

Anyway, I was open, became kind of open that way, but it had nothing to do with atheism to agnosticism. Yeah. And Cheryl, was, was the experience of your friend? Was that kind of just in the back of your mind? Yes. Yeah, for sure. Kind of like, and it [00:24:00] said, Mary treasured these things in their heart. So it was just tucked away there.

Like, okay, I don't know what happened there. You know, in college, that's when I really became kind of open to that. There's something I had gotten approached by the Moonies. And that's where I can see God's hand, because I had just been, it was around Halloween, and I had just been at a friend's party where I didn't really know anybody, and I felt very uncomfortable.

So I didn't like the idea of being in a situation where I don't know anybody. And at that time, I love your wife for this, I hated small talk. Like, can we just get to the deep stuff? And I love Kara, because Kara has shown why you have to do this. That's small talk. You, you get that opening into people's lives, so I'm learning.

But anyway, I was going to the eye doctor. I was in San Francisco and these two people come up to me and corner me. Two people, how did two people, but they, they do it deliberately. They, they swooped around so that one Standing on the street side, you know, and here's the bill and [00:25:00] you can't see what I'm doing, folks.

Sorry, here's right. The street side, someone standing there and then the other person is standing, maybe the way I was going so that they kind of trapped me, even though I mean, they must be studying that mentally. A person's not going to think going back. Is that right? I'm going that way. Anyway, they surrounded me and they're like, Oh, whatever, they start talking to me.

And Oh, you know, we, we have these dinners and you should come and, and that was after we talked for just a little bit, you know, kind of struck up a connection. And all I could think is, I don't want to go somewhere where I don't know anybody. But they're also talking about food, and I'll do almost anything for food.

And so I was like, I'd like to go because that would be a free meal. And, but I won't know anybody. And they're like, Oh, you know, we have this bus and you can just get on the bus. And I'm thinking, well, I would need to call my boyfriend. Well, you could call him from there. I'm like, no, I don't like that [00:26:00] idea.

And they really were very adamant about me not contacting him till I got to wherever. Cause I'm like, well, why can't he come with us? I don't know they had their reasons, but it I don't I don't fully know how I got out of it I don't know if I just say yeah, no, thank you. I have a good curiosity just for those that don't know who the moonies Yeah, tell us a little bit who are the moonies were very big back then.

This would have probably been like 1977 78 somewhere around there. They were a cult Valley of the Moon, in that area, Sun Yung Moon started this cult, and that was what they were known for. They would invite people to a meal, and you never left after that. And then somehow, I think you got, what they said was, they deprived you of food, or they fed you very little, so you became susceptible, and you weren't allowed to contact your family, and then they started, you know, brainwashing you into whatever their [00:27:00] philosophy was.

And you would see these things on the news or these stories of how people were trying to rescue their families and their families wouldn't want to leave because they'd been so indoctrinated into that. It was very scary, you know, because there's repercussions. It's the same with sex trafficking. Those women who are conditioned, it's very hard.

They've learned certain patterns of being that are very hard to break. And even after you come out of it, you'll find yourself maybe doing things that. Are really weird. Anyhow, I just did you get on the bus? No. No, I was sort of saying I just know because I the idea like I said of going somewhere where I don't know people and they wouldn't let me Call my boyfriend, of course, then there were no cell phones or anything So it was like, I don't like that idea.

And I don't know if it was before my eye appointment or I think it was before because the bus leaves, I think from a central area at a certain time. And so they said, [00:28:00] well, you could meet us here. And I was just like, yeah, no, that's okay. I'm glad I didn't do it. Cause I didn't know at the time I then was telling some friends what happened and then those were the moonies.

And I'm like, Oh, wow. So I didn't know. So do you view that as a, as a moment in your life that God spared you from something? Oh, definitely. Following him. Yeah, definitely. Because then this, a similar thing happened with Jehovah Witnesses. I got into argument, they came up to me. And at that time I had opened to the fact that there is a God, but this is what I say.

God doesn't want me to bow down and worship him. He is not egotistical. And if he does, he'll let me know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, so I'm fine where I am. He doesn't want me believing any certain way. Just as long as that I do believe in him. I'm okay So, you know the Jehovah Witnesses came and they were trying to say whatever they were trying to say and I'm just like well Why do I have to do it your way?

like And I don't remember what they said. I just remember saying, no, [00:29:00] I know. I'm sorry. I don't, I don't want to have anything just, I'm like, God, thank you. You just get me from these different things. So Cheryl, when, so I'm very curious, like when did your full acceptance of Jesus, like arrive, like, are we close to that?

Yeah. Husband. So I'm with husband. Number one, we met at the movie theater that I was working at cute little story, but I won't tell it. I didn't know really fully that he had been very involved in, what is it? First covenant? What do they call it? It's a Swedish or whatever denomination. And he had been the youth or the music or something.

I don't know. But anyway, we met and we started dating and he believed in God, but he was very anti organized religion. We're together and things are life. My life is unraveling pretty quickly. A lot of things happen. I had an abortion. I really believed. that child would be dead. So he was very into coke. At that time coke was really, so that was really cool.

I'm with this [00:30:00] guy who does coke. But slowly those things started falling away and moved a lot and in one of the places we lived there was a pastor living down the street. And I didn't know Earl, his name, had told the pastor that he would do some work, and the pastor paid him in advance, which is something Earl would do a lot, so he had his money so he could go buy drugs.

And Earl got arrested, because we had no money. He has, I don't even know how this happened, his dad, he hadn't had any contact, and somehow he got arrested. contacted with his dad, they got reconnected, but his dad sent him some of his work checks that I don't think was, I don't even know how this all happened, it was like not totally aware, all I know is that one day Earl has these checks that he's gonna go to the bank and check.

And cash, and whatever. The bank immediately found out they were forgeries. And Earl was at the Gap trying to buy stuff. I guess he was just trying to get the, I don't know what he was doing. And they called, oh no, they, [00:31:00] okay, so Cap called the bank, and the bank said, Oh, hold him. And Earl, I guess, got wind.

Something was going on, and he left. the shop and the security guard had a gunshot him and the next thing I'm getting a call where I'm working, your husband, I'm throwing off even by that, is in jail, he got shot but he's okay, I'm the paramedic and he wanted me to call you and let you know. So with that I had to go to the pastor and tell him.

Earl's in jail. He said to come tell you. I didn't know that the guy had paid him in advance. I didn't know anything. I had all this stuff that went around. I actually have a criminal record because of some stuff that Earl did. Crazy life that I was living for a while there. And that's why it was just crazy.

And I knew it. And it was like when I turned up pregnant, it was like, I can't do this. But I had never wanted to do that. Sadly, my mom has had had four abortions. So it wasn't because my mom was against it or anything. As a matter of fact, I don't even know she knows I ever did that. I almost died [00:32:00] too. That was totally legal.

It was sadly after three months it was in a hospital and Zirdin did not get all of the tissue out and I hemorrhaged a few weeks later and thankfully as much as Earl as whatever he got me to the hospital but all of these things are, you know, they are working together to like show me one that I'm not on a good path.

So I go to the pastor. to tell him. And I use Madeleine L'Engle. Do either of you know that author? She's, I think, Catholic, but she wrote these wonderful books with these families, science and music, and they made a movie of the one. I want to say, I always want to say A Wrinkle in Time. She's the one who wrote A Wrinkle in Time, and there's a series of books.

But when you read the books, the families are so beautiful, how together they are. There's so much. learning education, science, music, kind of what I felt like the environment I grew up in. Cause my mom was very much, she had us play games that I didn't realize were really rather [00:33:00] great educationally. And of course we all had to play some instrument and so on and so forth.

Aside, that's not true. She said, Oh, my kids stopped playing because of what happened during the symphony. That's not true. I don't think I ever thought of pursuing music. It was really more about art for me. Actually, I wanted to be have a. Nurses go, but anyway, so the pastor was very kind. He was like, well, is there anything I can do to help you?

And No, I think I was found out I was pregnant with hyacinth and somewhere around that time and I said sure he goes well How about if I drive you out to Santa Rita to see Earl? Thank you. Sure. Great. So one time he drove me out and on the way back, he got an inspiration for a sermon that was around math.

I don't even remember fully what it was, but he took some math principle and I love math and he connected it with how God's something and I'm just sitting there like, what?[00:34:00] 

And then there was being so helpful and I loved his home. His home felt like that book. Like I was in that story was so peaceful and it was like. This is what I want for my life. And then I realized I had better start going to his church because he, they're being so nice to me. So you end up at church because you feel guilty that they're being so nice.

I love it. But also because just how excited you got. And I love to see people in the light bulbs go on and they get these ideas. At the time I was working, so I couldn't, but then it got to a point where I had to stop working because I was pregnant and I wasn't allowed to be. So working at Fenton's ice creamery, perfect place for a pregnant woman.

That was great. Cause I've been weighed. Well, at one point I weighed 107 pounds, but then I was, you know, doing coke and all that. And so I was 115 when I went, Got pregnant with hyacinth and so I start [00:35:00] going to the church. It's a Methodist church. God bless them. And I would listen and I got very old. This is so funny.

So I started going Earl was actually still in jail. There was a lawyer who was part of the congregation. So he became Earl's because It was illegal, actually, it turned out, for that security guard to have had a gun. He was an ex felon, so he really had no business having a gun and shooting, so there was a whole, you know, case and whatever being worked out, and so there again, they're helping.

They were really a wonderful community. But what I started doing was I started listening. My friend's experience. What was that? Here I am now in church. I was gonna say I used to curse up a storm and I guess I was in church cursing. And Earl says to me this after he's out of Jersey, he probably shouldn't do that.

Oh, um, yeah, you had no idea that that was okay. Yeah, I know. And I really don't think They were enough, whatever that they didn't [00:36:00] care, but you know, he had his background and it's like, you don't do certain things. And so we were going there for a little bit, very, we did get married. I had hyacinth, he was actually still in jail when I had hyacinth, but he was in work furlough program.

So we got to come out and be there and they're just, you know, loving on us and. I'm not hearing these people don't know what the Holy Spirit's all about. And I'm like, okay, I don't know. It was just very interesting. And like I said, then denominations, they moved that pastor. I guess you're supposed to only be five years at most, and you've been more than five years.

So they moved him. And the new guy who came in just didn't connect with it. And yeah, I remember the first time I went there, remembering from when my grandmother, I'm like, okay, how do you, I asked friends, how do you cross yourself? And one friend goes, I don't think they do that in that church. Yeah, you were thinking still Catholic, right?

I don't know. And so anyway, but I'm, I'm open and I'm listening. [00:37:00] And they had a, what was it called? They had this program. It was like a 12 week program where you're learning, you're going more in depth and studying and I was doing it and I loved it, but they still didn't really know about the Holy Spirit.

I remember in conversations and I don't know. Well, how did you know about the Holy Spirit you're talking about? Is that from your conversation with Debbie? Yeah, and then there was also a young lady at that church We became friends with because we got involved in the youth ministry and there was one of the women She came out of a satanic thing.

So she had heard voices and she didn't share that with many people But she and I were talking and I really believed her. Yeah But when you're there and nobody there seems to know what, and as I said, Earl and I, poor Earl, unfortunately was very addicted and is very, now I know, a narcissist and abusive and needed help.

They, they also were having hard times. And one day we had had a big fight and he calls, [00:38:00] we were watching the 700 club early in the morning, I guess. And he calls. I have to back up because he was also working for some construction company I think it was and the guy there had a couple of times talked to her about this church shiloh christian fellowship Oh, it was you know, really good or whatever So we had a young lady from the methodist church who would babysit hyacinth occasionally And she then one day says, you know, i've started going i've noticed that she wasn't at our church She said yeah, I started going to this church shiloh christian fellowship.

Okay, number two time You So whatever day that was, I don't remember if it was before church, it was just a separate day, call the 700 club. And there's a woman that he talks to Eve West. She's like, well, can I pray for you? And he says, yes. And they pray and they do whatever she's well, where do you go in Oakland?

She's well, you know, I go to this church. And so again, Shiloh again, you ought to come sometime. So that's what it was. That was a different time. So then one morning we had been [00:39:00] fighting and it was now late. And it was like, you know, their service lasts maybe a half hour, you know, it's very set. And we're like, well, let's try this church.

And we go now to back up to we had been in one time we were up in Tahoe. I don't think it was with the youth retreat. We have been in Tahoe for something and went to a more charismatic. And I remember kind of being in the back and, you know, it was, I liked that it was a little bit more exuberant and expressive, you know, people are raising their hands and I'm kind of like, okay, I don't know.

So we go to Shiloh, very similar, but it's very big and we're in the back and people are raising their hand and praying, whatever. And at the end, after the sermon, there's the altar call. And I thought, our life is in such a mess. So I had my eyes closed, raised my hand. I guess Earl had his eyes closed. He raised his hand.

So, okay. So come down to the altar. So, okay, so go down [00:40:00] to the altar. And I prayed with this woman who had this, like the most gorgeous blue eyes, which is actually funny because sometimes Hyacinth's eyes, when she Her eyes get bloodshot will turn that same blue. It's just not your oldest daughter. Yeah, it's just this incredible blue And we're praying and I was very vague.

I just said, oh, you know, i'm having problems with my husband And I don't know whatever I said. She prayed kind of short and we got done and Shortly thereafter. I thought oh, I really want to find her and talk to her. I think I want to be more specific about what's going on, because Earl was praying with someone and they were taking a long time.

So they're like, okay. So I'm looking. I couldn't even remember what she looked like. I just remembered those blue eyes. That's all I remembered about her, but I didn't see anybody like that. So I then wait and finally Earl's done and the gentleman says, well, we're inviting you over for lunch. And I said to them, I said, well, I would really like to find the woman that [00:41:00] I prayed with.

I said, Oh, well, sure. And he says, okay, well, how about, um, whatever time it was, they said, you know, around two. So we went back home. We changed, we go, we ring the doorbell and guess who answers the door? The lady with the blue eyes. It was just like, wow. And she says, Oh, this is the woman I prayed with today.

So that was like the first like, Oh God, whoa. And I don't know whether I did talk to her more at that point. We did get plugged in, but so we started going there quickly. So they also had a Bible college. And at the time, Pastor Violet was that she was a founding pastor and she was in charge and. Everybody had to go to Bible college.

So all the Sunday school classes were the Bible college classes. So if you didn't actually enroll in the Bible college, you just audited, but you were getting information. You just weren't doing the papers and the tests and all of that. So I didn't know that [00:42:00] was abnormal. I just thought this is great. And this is one of the things why I drive as far as I drive to go to living water because one of the things she said, and I don't know if it was when we were reading the book of Ruth or there was something and she was talking about loyalty.

She said, so you don't leave a church just because there's something you don't like or whatever. She said, you pray, you be a support and you pray that if they're going off course that God put them back, that they start listening. So that for me, you, yeah, you don't just jump ship because you think. What's going on here?

You know what that reminds me of? Is the prophets in the Old Testament. They're linked to Israel. There's so many prayers of prophets in the Old Testament who pray in a way as if they are committing the sin of their nation. They are so tethered to their people that they take over. Ownership of what was taking place.

And I think to your point, we are so quick to end [00:43:00] things when it doesn't go away. Instead of being an instrument of redemption, of reconciliation, of I'm going to pour into this until they don't want me anymore. Yeah. Or till God says, go, I don't want you there. Exactly. And, oh, so that did happen when I moved to, I was going to one church.

And I really did feel like the Lord said, yeah, this isn't it. And I had, I was going to two, I started going to two churches and then it was like, no commit to third day worship center. So that started that, but anyway, so back, so here we are and we're now in that and just dived in, you know, the other thing that was hard about the Methodist church, you know, it went there.

I don't know if either one of you would know, but we'll see. Did you know Al Adels? He was a coach for the Warriors. Okay, so he went there, but that was out of however many people that was the only Dark face that was there and then it wasn't interracial. So that was important to me It's great that you're [00:44:00] african american, but if you're not interracial My experience was you don't get me because I was discriminated against by More actually by African American growing up.

I was an African American enough. And then of course it was, then it was not, I wasn't black enough. I was an Oreo. I was whatever. And one of my best friends in high school, he was like, apologize. Cause when we first met, he was Samoan. He was like, yeah, I thought you were an Oreo. And it was like, gosh, I'm me.

Yeah, you know exactly and as radical as my mom was though. She sheltered me I was the baby because it was really sad when I think in my brother remembers all these things people said he remembers someone saying To my mom you should be thankful. They didn't come out polka dotted. I was illegal in a lot of states When I was born and I'm the youngest, you know, so it's like wow But my mom really sheltered me my brother and my sister somehow [00:45:00] weren't so sheltered So they were more aware of things I was this happy go lucky kid, like, well, I, I rarely think about, I do now more because just of the climate and the way things have changed, what I look like, that if I'm in a room of very, very light people, that I'm like the darkest person in the room.

I never, like, so what? It should be so what? It should be. Yeah. And that's, but that's how I was raised, being in the United Nations community. We, I was just, I'm so thankful for that. Yeah. Because I feel like I can embrace anybody. Anyhow, so here we are and at Shiloh and yeah, so Cheryl you're attending Shiloh church You're seem to be getting pretty plugged in Earl was being pretty plugged in Would you say at this point that you've surrendered your life to Jesus?

Not 100 percent You know, I have accepted that Jesus came he died. So why didn't I surrender and [00:46:00] rose again? So I I am believing all of that, but I don't think I have physically said I mean, I know I haven't I surrender. There were just a lot of stuff going on with Earl and myself and just not knowing what to do.

Crazy. Still, life was pretty crazy. Earl was a complicated person, I think, you know, he got, they were saying then you couldn't get addicted to cocaine, but he was pretty addicted to cocaine. And I sadly don't know how Earl was raised because I've come to find out since he passed that a lot of things he told me were all lies.

He said he was a Green Beret, he'd been in the army three years, so I'm thinking when he passed, Yay! Hyacinth and Alex are gonna get survivor's benefits, they're gonna I don't know, he was in the army 11 months. And he used to hate when people talk about Green Bay. So I don't, I don't know, but anyway, it was shortly after we started going to Shiloh, I was in the apartment we were living in and I was praying [00:47:00] and I was sitting there in tears and I just, I did, I threw my hands up and I said, God, I surrender.

And I really felt, God said, everything is going to be okay. So I come running out of there and I go up to Earl and I was like, everything's going to be okay. I mean, sadly, everything was not okay. With Earl and our relationship, but everything was okay because I could surrender. And then I remember being able to pick up my Bible and reading it was now effortless.

You know, before that I used to, how do people read this thing? And especially the old Testament. And it was like, Oh, I don't know. I would try and struggle. And it just, it's just so much changed. And then, so this is a hard one because of different people's takes on it. Shiloh's take the time was. You had to speak in tongues and I went and I, I did have an encounter and I did, but I now know that's not right.

Yeah. Yeah. It is a gift of the spirit. We recognize it. It's not a [00:48:00] requirement. Right. Right. So whatever. And fast forward, I got involved in the dance ministry and one thing led to another. And then finally I realized Earl would choke me. And I never thought anything per se about it because I used to think he wasn't punching me.

There were no black and blue bruises and thankfully I was going to a Christian counselor who said, you know, you could die from choking. But that isn't even what got me to leave him. His behavior towards Hyacinth started becoming very questionable and the counselor said, I'm going to have to call CPS.

And then I was, he's going to kill me. The counselor was like, yeah, that's, he has to do that. And God worked because my grandmother would write, he would always want to know what she said, what, whatever. And I had started thinking I need to leave. So we were living in Oakland Hills and this is what really little cabin, but in the back it had these chicken coops that whoever previously had tried to make into [00:49:00] like rooms and we had washing.

So I had put a big box and just started throwing clothes in there and he would never go up there. And one day my grandmother sent me some money and Earl didn't ask anything or no, she didn't say anything. Usually she would say, Oh, I'm sending you. She didn't say anything in letters so I could let him read the letter and And you kept the money and I kept the money and I had planned to leave This was like a monday or tuesday and I had planned to leave him on the friday and I called this shelter And the shelter that I thought I was calling they were having their whatever meeting So it was a different shelter that answered and they're like, why don't you leave right now?

Like why are you gonna wait to friday? Yeah, you don't know what could happen, right? And i'm like, oh I have the car Earl had me take him to work and I came home with the car So I have the car I guess I could leave and I did that this most amazing thing and who knows if this I don't know that or I don't I mean he might have accidentally Killed me.

I don't think he would have [00:50:00] deliberately but that day in the shelter and then I don't know if it was while they Were talking to me. Yeah, so the shelter I went to was in Livermore one woman in the shelter So they have a rule you can't see your ex Person for so many days. She decided to go meet him.

Guess what? He killed her So I arrive at this shelter with all this going on and being like totally freaked out but I Safe, and then while I was there, I found a church called Oasis of Life, and it was so perfect, because here I was, away from whatever, in an oasis, and it just was really amazing, the whole thing, and it wasn't easy, I mean, it just, it wasn't easy at all, but, you know, when I returned, Shiloh embraced me.

Yeah, I mean a lot of things happened because then I ended up with husband number two Who really wasn't very different from husband number one, except he wasn't physical So it was like wow, okay, but anyway, God's been very good sadly. I also don't remember a lot [00:51:00] of things I really feel like it was like On survival and sometimes hyacinth will tell me certain things and it's like, okay I mean, I look at your story and I see the fact of God's faithfulness Despite the environment you were raised in he protected you Despite the choices that you made yourself He protected you and he made a way for you Yeah, I made a way for you to escape the lifestyle that was gonna lead to destruction Between the abortion One time I done too much coke one night and I remember thinking I got to go to the bathroom and coming back I was just like I just want to go to bed and I thought I laid down on the bed Earl told me no he said there was a dresser with very sharp edge and I dived at it So I had this big like not a it didn't break the skin, but it was amazing that something worse didn't happen Yeah, I didn't wake up like right then but I mean I started to see my life wasn't good.

[00:52:00] Thankfully my mother You Did raise a whatever child and it was like I don't like I had a weird thing like you can't do more than one drug at a time. So, I was doing coke, couldn't smoke, couldn't do whatever. Which is a good thing that you had this rule. Where did it come from? Right? I guess, yeah. It was weird.

I know I look back and I think my closest friend in high school got involved in heroin. Of course she told me, she said, I know you'd be mad if I didn't tell you. But the fact that I was with Earl, he went ballistic when I told him that my friend had offered, cause he was like, don't do that. Yeah. That he had some weird, whatever.

You just don't. I mean, sadly his journey just went, cause he ended up dying basically of a drug overdose. Pharmaceutical drugs for me. I have always danced in dance has always been a way to express my emotions So I went to Shiloh and they had that I was able to dance and just I can't not Because I feel like to describe [00:53:00] God and everything just to stand there isn't enough.

I need to use all of self space to do that. And that also has to do anything with my art. And you just use everything around you because he's so great. Like, how do you, I don't know how do you contain it all? Yeah. That's one thing I really appreciate about you is your willingness to dance before the Lord, unashamed.

Does it matter? That's the one thing I can do. Cause at Shiloh, there was, we had a team, we'd go out. Like and they do block parties and everything and the dancers would dance. I never had a problem dancing in, I mean, but if I have to talk to people, you know, that's so hard. Yeah. Oh, could you just like watch me dance?

Yeah. Well, thank you for coming on here and sharing and sharing it. Yeah. You had to tell us. A hundred percent. Yeah. You know, and I don't think we have much time to dive into the rest of the story, but I [00:54:00] I'm going to rest assure our listeners that God continued the pattern of saving Cheryl. Yes, because it's a process, right?

Like we're all a process, right? You went in and a mess. And he is making a masterpiece. Yes. That's so cool. Yeah. God's masterpiece. Yeah. Cause then life hasn't been easy. It, it hasn't been so yeah. When people say, oh, your promise is like, no, you're not, but God is faithful. I wish our listeners. In many ways, because you know, we're in studio, we're in person as we're recording this and to see everything around your story and, and being able to see you share it, you know, I think there's just a little bit of taste for our listeners to get a, at least a glimpse of that, to, to know that from your story, all the intricate details of it, I mean, to see the hand of God on your life, Cheryl is, is amazing.

I mean, it is [00:55:00] so incredible and to, and to see it firsthand as you're sharing your story. It's also just to remember, I don't often think back on everything that I've been through. So I don't think, Oh, yeah, whatever. But then when I start retelling, and it's just like, I've been through a lot, and I just think when people see me, they may not understand.

I mean, there's a whole nother story about something that happened at Third Day Worship Center, but the bottom line is, I don't just get up there flippantly. You know, to whom, what is it about worshiping much? Like the alabaster box, you give everything, and because he's done so much, it's just, And it's not me, I mean, even though I was raised to be whatever the bottom line is that's not who I was raised to be Well, that's that's a beautiful ending to this beautiful story and and truly the best is yet to come Cheryl I'm so thankful that you came on today and were able to [00:56:00] share the The authentic story and you know that the foundation of, of this podcast really does come from that mandate, but it's not a forced mandate.

It's just sharing your story of all the things God has done. And I'm so grateful that you've been able to do that today. Thank you so much for being on the show. You're welcome. I have to thank you guys. Yeah, I love it. God rescues us. Out of all our circumstances, the foundation of Jesus in my life podcast really does come from the story of Luke chapter eight Where Jesus is kind of semi confronted by a man who is not only demon oppressed He's demon possessed and he's been cast out of society left to his own devices Jesus approaches him obviously confronts that delivers him and saves him heals him And in that moment, the man says to Jesus, I'm sure looking eye to eye, I want to now follow you, let me follow you.[00:57:00] 

And Jesus says, no, no, I got a different assignment for you. I want you to go back to your family and tell them what I've done for you. And this man, I just love that. The end part of the story on Luke eight, where he goes and shares, I would imagine he shared it with his family, but that was not enough for him.

He had to go share it with the rest of the town. And so many people were, I'm sure. We're obviously amazed, but also questioning. Was this really true? Was this, did this really happen? Who was it that, that you met? And I'm sure he just constantly would remind them. It's Jesus. It's Jesus. Cheryl, you have done that today.

And I'm so grateful that you have come on the show to proclaim Jesus in your life. Thank you for sharing. Everybody else. Stay tuned every Tuesday for new episodes. And

now a reflection on today's interview. Cheryl reminds me. [00:58:00] That God is worthy to be praised for everything that he's done in our life. And Cheryl really does that every Sunday at our church. And I'm encouraged today to be more expressive in my gratitude towards God. And I hope you're encouraged to as well.

Lastly. I want to throw in a little bonus clip here of something that Cheryl said before we started the interview. We had just prayed and I was thanking God for how He has worked in Cheryl's life. And this is what she said coming out of that prayer. Can I just say something as you were praying that hit me?

Was I found a book, I was going to bring it, my mom says I'm trying to get rid of all her books, that was, I think it was someone who was a pastor or minister who defected, and so he's writing a book about, you know, Christians and how it's all based in Jesus, there's hardly even little evidence that Jesus was real.

Anyway, all of that to say, Yes, I wasn't raised [00:59:00] as a Christian, but I can say for sure, because as you were thanking the Lord for the gifting that God has had his hand on me, he's prepared me. And so I think he prepares everybody and he made it, whether, because God is still, God is real. And just because you don't believe doesn't mean God isn't still there working in your life.

And so, yes, I can see how God has prepared me to be this person in worship in my life. Whatever that I am today. So, okay.