faith
feature
title
Retha Brown
Photography by Laura McBryde
R
retha brown
Retha Brown has had a personal relationship with Jesus Christ since 1986.
When she married Ronnie, a pastor, “His faith in and love for God, his love for
his family and mankind, his humble but strong gentleness and his calm spirit
all were very inspiring to me. He handled circumstances with so much love.”
In June of 2014, Ronnie was hospitalized. “For ten days, he appeared to be
doing well. When the doctor informed us they had done everything medically possible to help him, I thought God was going to take care of this and make
him whole again. I became bitter and angry. ‘I have trusted You. Surely this
is not happening. I know You will not do this to me.’” Ronnie passed away
on July 7.
Retha could not eat, sleep, or focus. “I thought I would lose my mind or
die; either way was good for me at that time. Although I was not suicidal,
I didn’t want to deal with the pain. If I lost my mind, I wouldn’t remember
what happened. Almost everything that I believed prior to Ronnie’s passing
went right out the window.”
As time passed, she continued to ask God, with much anger and resentment, to bring Ronnie back. For weeks, she refused to go to church. Although
she eventually return ed, her heart was void of the Message she truly needed
to hear. “I constantly blocked things out of my mind that the Pastor preached
– how God is a healer, the story of Job, and what a wonderful God we serve.
I didn’t want to hear it and I refused to accept it.”
But, God had been preparing Retha all along. “While I had been
meditating one day, months before, God had showed me a vision. I was driving and Ronnie was the passenger. I saw a dark acorn in the sky that had
the appearance to suck us up. I heard the voice of the Lord say, ‘Do not get
weary in well doing; you will reap if you faint not.’ I asked Ronnie to drive and,
immediately, the acorn vanished. I looked at the clock and it was 7:14 PM.
The next morning, as I was taking my granddaughters to school, I looked up
to the sky in the same direction the acorn appeared in my vision and the sun
was in its place, shining bright. Again, I heard the voice of the Lord, saying,
‘Stay the course.’ I looked at the clock. It was 7:14 AM. I hurried home to
tell Ronnie and my best friend, trying to figure out what 7:14 meant. When
Ronnie made his transition from earth to Heaven, God showed me what He
had been preparing me for… what 7:14 meant. Ronnie transitioned on July
7, 2014… the seventh month, seventh day, and fourteenth year of the millennium.” At that moment, Retha no longer wanted to be shown anything else
from God. continued...
30
NOVEMBER 2015
SHEMAGAZINE.COM