THUNDERSTORM BRINGS PEACE
What would it be like to be part of family
- not just a number in a social services file?
WHEN GLENYS SCARLE was three years old she woke to find her mother lying dead beside her. "It was 1966 in Stourbridge - my earliest memory," says Glenys, "It's only recently that I've been able to cope with it.
" I remember the feeling of touching her to try and wake her and she was cold and not moving. When I looked at her face she had a black eye. I don't remember any more - just that. Years later I was told what happened."
Glenys's dad had caused the black eye but he'd never intended to harm his wife - the beating had triggered off a fatal heart attack.
"One of my brothers went to Nan's. My sister stayed with Dad. But me and my other brother were whisked into care. I felt incredibly hurt that Dad kept my sister instead.
"Years afterwards, Dad explained the reason he had put me into care wasn't because I was a horrible child but because I reminded him so much of Mum. He knew every time he looked at me he'd feel guilty. I didn't know that, so I grew up with a powerful root of rejection."
Between the ages of three and sixteen, children's homes and foster parents passed in a blur. A kind of grey institutionalism spread over Glenys. Her emotions shrunk and froze and she found it hard to make friends or trust people. After all, anyone who got close would soon be taken away from her.
" When you're in care you have no foundation, no identity, no background, no history. You have no rights - they put you where they put you - not where you want to go.
"My heart searched for a family and a sense of belonging - not just being a number in a social services file. I wanted people to know me- the good, the bad the indifferent - 'this is me.'"
Leaving care at 16, Glenys trained as a florist. Genuine friendships seemed to elude her but, at 19, she met a young man who seemed to care. They lived together for five years.
"I was terrified of losing him and became a doormat. One day I came home to find my worst fears had happened - he'd stripped the house of everything and gone off to marry someone else. "That was it - now I knew I was worthless. I had a breakdown and it was a year before I could go back to work."
One night, Glenys and another florist were finishing some wedding flowers till 2am at the shop, when there was a bad thunderstorm. Terrified, she shut herself in the store-cupboard.
"The other florist was a Christian. Instead of telling me not to be such a baby, she said 'You're not going home on your own in this storm. Stop with us for the night'. She prayed for me and I found such peace that the rest of the storm didn't bother me. I'd had no Christian experience before, but I'd always known Someone was watching over me. Now I knew - that 'Someone' was Jesus."
Glenys joined a local church and seven years later, visiting a friend in hospital, met Wendy and Rhoda from the Jesus Army community house in Rednall. Trust grew and with the trust came healing and all the things she'd longed for - family and a sense of belonging.
"The turning point came when I had a major operation in 1994 which went wrong, leaving my guts knotted. Friends at the Oxford community house invited me recuperate with them. For four months I was so ill I couldn't even lift a kettle. For nearly a year I felt no use to anyone. Gradually, to my amazement, I realised they loved and accepted me just as I was.
"When I was better, I moved into my own place and started work at the community's central offices where I look after the Jesus Shop resources.
"God's teaching me that I can be me . Not someone who's holding everything together. I can cry, I can be angry and I'm still accepted.
"In the world at large, if you have a bad day people don't want to know you. But even a bad day is a good day to Jesus because He can help you to deal with the issues that come up - so you grow and move on stronger."
This article has been extracted from Jesus Life magazine, published by Jesus Fellowship
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Jesus Changed My Life
