My Journey Through the Wilderness: Into the Heart of Jesus Christ

By Aileen Roman

Dear Reader,

As I began to write this book I originally thought I would only share the past (15) months of my personal experiences and circumstances that led me to where I am today.

I soon realized that in order to paint a clear picture of how I got to this place in my life I needed to go further back. As I reflect back to how this unusual journey started I must first begin with some life changing events which shaped the beginnings of this journey.

As you read on you will experience a journey with circumstances that took place over a period of 12 years. So come with me as I take you on my journey into the heart of Jesus Christ.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Feb 13, 2015
• ISBN: 9781496965318

Aileen Roman

Aileen Roman is the mother of two sons’ one daughter and grandmother of four. She is excited to share a part of her life with her readers and how God’s love brought her through.

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© 2015 Aileen Roman. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 02/13/2015

ISBN: 978-1-4969-6532-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-6531-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015900868

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Scripture quotations are taken from the following translations of the Bible:

New International Version® (NIV®) Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. ™. Published by Zondervan® Corporation. Used by permission.

King James Version (Authorized Version) (KJV). First published in 1611. Classic Reference Bible, Copyright 1983, Published by Zondervan® Corporation.

New American Standard Version (NASB) New American Standard Bible Copyright (c) 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Luckman Foundation, La Habra, Calif. All rights reserved http://www.lockman.org

Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright © 1996, 2004 by Tyndale Charitable Trust. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Wheaton Illinois 60189. All rights reserved.

New King James Version, © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

Contents

Chapter 1

Prelude

Chapter 2

Introduction to my Journey

Chapter 3

My Exodus from the wilderness

Chapter 4

God restores my relationship with Him

Chapter 5

Into the Heart of Jesus, Into Adventure!

Chapter 6

Waiting on Him during Times of Growth

Chapter 7

Does God Still Speak to Us?

Chapter 8

Be Encouraged!

Chapter 9

Keep your Courage

Chapter 10

The Joy of Praying Again!

Chapter 11

My Restoration

I

dedicate this book to my Mom. She has impacted my life in the most positive of ways. It is through her prayers for me that I accepted Jesus Christ in July 1981.

She is a true example of a woman of prayer. I continually heard her praying for her children during the early morning hours, asking God to save our souls. She continues to pray for me every day.

Thank you Ma, I love you!

Dear Reader,

As I began to write this book, I originally thought I would share only the past fifteen months of my personal experiences and the circumstances that led me to where I am today.

I soon realized that, in order to paint a clear picture of how I got to this place in my life, I needed to go further back. As I reflect back to how this unusual journey started. I must first begin with some life-changing events that shaped the beginnings of this journey. I had given in to the wilderness mentality—turning away from God’s presence and not trusting in Him for the direction of my life.

As you read on, you will experience a journey full of circumstances that took place over a period of 12 years. So come with me as I take you on my journey into the heart of Jesus Christ.

Chapter 1

Prelude

Prior to my wilderness journey, I experienced several life-changing events that led me to the wilderness.

It was 1986; I was in the twelfth year of my marriage with my childhood sweetheart. We had three children together, two boys and a girl. The marriage at this time was pretty rocky. One day he said to me, I don’t think I want to go on with this marriage, I need some time to think. During the next six months or so he would say he wanted to make it work, then change his mind and say, I am not sure. I knew things were different. There were days he didn’t come home, and when he did he wreaked with perfume. Well, the inevitable happened. He came home after being out for a few nights and I found a letter in his back pocket. The letter was written by the woman he was with those nights he didn’t come home. It was very explicit with what happened during their times together.

He knew I would find this letter because he knew I was in the habit of emptying his pants pocket before I put them in the laundry basket. You see, years prior I didn’t check his pockets and mistakenly washed his driver’s license. After reading the letter I confronted him with a question. I asked him what he wanted to do because I was not going to settle for being the third person in our marriage. He responded by saying that he wanted to try to make it work.

A few months passed and one morning he left for work and never came home again. After a few years of waiting for him to return I finally filed for divorce. The next time the kids or I heard from him was about three years later. It was a very brief telephone conversation to let us know his dad passed away. We haven’t heard from or about him since that day.

After a failed marriage of what ended up to be thirteen years with him, I was left as a young divorced woman with the responsibility of taking care of our three small children, ages two, three, and seven.

This also left me with the challenge of going back into the workforce after a period of more than ten years. That was pretty scary. At this point in my life, I was a fairly new Christian, but I somehow knew that God would take me through this. The kids and I moved in with my mom, and I soon found employment at one of the major banks as an Administrative Assistant to the Vice President.

I remember feeling so inadequate on my first day; it had been so long since I had worked outside of the home. I soon learned that, when I asked the Lord to show me how to do particular tasks at work, He would give me wisdom and knowledge about the task and how to execute them (James 1:5, Psalm 32:8, Ecclesiastes 2:26).

That helped me become good at my work. Noticing this, my boss asked me to be a designated trainer for new employees. I was excited, as I saw this as a good opportunity to share the knowledge God had given me. I originally began training the new employees for our office, but soon after I was asked to do the training for every office in our region.

My daily job responsibilities were increasing, and needless to say, the added responsibility of training for additional offices was becoming overwhelming and quite challenging.

On many occasions, I would meet with my boss to let her know that the job was becoming too much for one person to manage. I asked her for help regarding my ever-increasing workload. She would always say to me that she had an open-door policy and if things became too much, to let her know. This went on for years without resolve.

This became stressful and began to cause physical problems for me. I developed chronic migraine headaches. I was getting them on a daily basis, sometimes back to back; just when I would seem to get relief from one, another would begin. These headaches would