From the Archives: 2009

Written by Medora Hoskins

I never really felt like I had a place to call home. My dad was an officer in the Air Force, so we moved around a lot. I was born in Hawaii and lived in Washington, D.C., Norway, Germany, and Alabama—all by the fifth grade. That was when my dad retired and we moved to Charlotte. 

I loved adventure and loved moving but this was different. I had always lived within the safety and security of a military base. The idea of living outside the fences was scary. In Charlotte, I always felt like the new kid, the outsider. My junior high years were the first years of forced busing in Charlotte, which produced riots and fighting. 

Survival became the goal. I coped by skipping school a lot. I began drinking and got involved in sex, drugs and rock & roll, as they say. When I was in the eleventh grade I transferred to a private school to get a fresh start, but I found a way to get involved in the same old stuff. I learned to manipulate people and situations to stay out of trouble.

My family became members of Providence United Methodist Church in Charlotte, but, because of my worldview, I never heard or responded to the name of Jesus. To my knowledge, the military had chapel but no Sunday School. The people in my extended family are good, fine people, but Jesus was not a part of our everyday life, other than praying at meals and going to church on Sunday.

After high school, I went to UNCG for a year before transferring to App State. I have always loved the mountains, camping and hiking, and I wanted to ski, so App State was a logical place to go to school. But, unfortunately, my old habits followed me to App. I skipped most classes but somehow managed to pass and get a teaching certificate.

From there I decided to go out west. I spent a year in Utah, Wyoming and Colorado, where I continued to make bad decisions. I supported myself and my wild living by teaching skiing and waiting tables. I had no car and no money. After a year I decided to come back to North Carolina. I missed the colors and the seasons. I was also thinking it was time to settle down, marry and have a family.

A year later I was married to a guy whose family I had known through high school. We had 2 children and stayed together for 13 years. But I grew restless once again and looked for another geographic cure for my unsettled soul. 

I called my mom and asked if the kids and I could move in with her and Dad. I had stayed clean while married, but when I moved back home I drifted back into my old habits of partying. All this while I tried different churches looking for something that would make some sense of my life but I never found it.

After a year and a half at home, I found an apartment. In an apartment near mine, there was a man I couldn’t help but notice. He also had two kids and was going through a divorce, but there was something very different about him. Even though they were separated, he and his wife were always nice to each other and were always looking out for the best interests of the kids. He went to church every Sunday, even when he didn’t have his kids with him. That was baffling to me.

We struck up a friendship that developed into hours and hours of talking. Our kids played together and we kept each other’s kids when necessary. He talked a lot about his beliefs and his trust in God. All the while he was always so respectful of me. He never condemned me or belittled me. I had never been treated like that before. Slowly our friendship developed into more, but Jeff was clear that he could not marry a non-believer.

He invited me to the Singles Sunday School Class at his church. The people were so nice and I liked it so much I kept going back. Then one day at the end of the worship service I found myself going down to the altar where I gave my life to Christ. The change in my life since that day has been amazing. My habits, my decision making and even my language are all radically different.

Jeff and I were married in 1996. Everything was perfect, except I still just was not a city girl. One day Jeff learned of a job opportunity in his field at Samaritan’s Purse in Boone. He applied, interviewed and got the job. We moved to Boone and bought a house. I remember very clearly the first day I stepped out onto the deck of my new home in the mountains. God placed us here in His amazing grace and goodness.

How crazy is it that after the lifestyle I chose and the wreck I left along the way, Jesus gave me all of this? He gave me His life first and then gave me a home in the mountains, a beautiful marriage and a family, and He gave Jeff and me jobs that are after our own hearts.

He also gave me the full knowledge that it isn’t about living here, or our great friendship and marriage or anything else, but an ongoing love relationship with Him who first loved us while we were yet sinners. 

AMEN! I could finally say for the first time in my life, “I am home.”