Bridegroom in the Clouds : Book 2: Bridge Stories

By Susan Shultz

This spiritually stirring read is book 2 of the Bridegroom in the Clouds series by Susan Shultz.

Now with God's promise in hand, Susan still waited for her groom to return. But since God never wastes the waiting times, He began to move in her life once again. He began to orchestrate the events of her life in order to prepare h

• Language: English
• Publisher: Palmetto Publishing
• Release date: Sep 8, 2021
• ISBN: 9781638375579

Susan Shultz

Author Bio:In college, Susan was heavily involved with Campus Crusade for Christ (now Cru). After graduation she attended a Discipleship Training School through Youth With A Mission (YWAM), which led her to doing mission work in Japan. She also spent a year in Paris working for Campus Crusade. She then joined International Students Inc. (ISI), witnessing to international students first in her hometown in Kansas, then through mission work in China. God then called her to focus on spreading the Word of God through her own testimony. Now, whether through written testimony or other artforms that reflect God's story in her life, she testifies and inspires others to do the same.Susan is the author of Bridegroom in the Clouds Book 1: The Promise.

Book preview

Preface

G

od has used His calling on my life to share my testimony to redeem one of my biggest regrets, using it to now glorify Him. This regret is the fact that I never really had a chance to listen to the stories of my grandparents, for as a child, I never really knew that this was important. I now wish, however, that I had been the woman that I am now back when they were alive, for I would have asked them quite different questions. I would have taken the time to learn about their life stories and their personal journeys with God as a means to now help me with mine. Sadly, my story and regret is not uncommon, for as it is, most stories today end up dying out with the people who lived them, their legacies forgotten, for most Christians today never take the time while they are alive to write their stories or to share them with other believers, mainly due to the lack of interest from others. But this is so important to God, for I have personally seen, as I have worked in numerous Christian bookstores, just how much modern testimonies can still be used by God to impact lives, such testimonies as those of Jim Elliot, Corrie ten Boom, and Abraham Lincoln, just to name a few. Even though dead, these people’s lights are still shining for Christ because their stories are still being made known.

What God has shown me is the fact that these people, as well as those in the Bible, did not start out as well-known people with well-known testimonies; they simply started out like you and me, as small-town people who didn’t realize that as they lived a life with Christ, they were living out a life and a story that would outlive themselves, a story that God still uses to impact His people. Our stories have the power to do the same, for Christ is the Word made flesh, and if He lives in you through the power of the Holy Spirit, then know that He still longs to testify to the world through you. As Jesus said in John 15:26–27, When the Counselor comes, whom I will send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who goes out from the Father, he will testify about me. And you also must testify, for you have been with me from the beginning. We all have a calling. All of God’s children have a story worth telling, a story worth living out, because each one of us is a Star in God’s continuously unfolding story.

CHAPTER ONE

Setting the Stage

G

od did amazing things on my mission trip to China, and I did end up filling up the digital voice recorder that He had led me to buy before I went, giving me yet more to dictate once I got home. Eventually, God upgraded me again to voice-recognition software. This was also prior to having a smartphone and so a blessing for the time, for it came with a headset microphone that allowed me to speak while the computer typed for me. No more dictating previously recorded words! During this season God began to show me that my journey was about so much more than Joe and me. He began to truly speak to me about the power of a testimony and His desire for His children to testify. If I thought filling up a tape a day was a lot, I had no idea what God was about to do, for I went on to write hundreds and hundreds of pages with that voice-recognition software. It is all content that I know God will bring forth in His perfect timing.

After that outpouring, I guess you could say that God gave me a sabbatical, and I needed it. But then in 2010, He began to move in my life once again, orchestrating the events of my life in order to prepare me for the fulfillment of His promise to me and for my wedding day. And in doing so, He began to paint a beautiful picture depicting how His people, too, should live in preparation for His return and for their ultimate wedding day to Him as His Bride, the Church. Through the events of my life, He unveiled a message that spoke about His desire that we begin living lives that testify to Him. It was a blessed time, as it seemed like nothing happened to me that didn’t have symbolic spiritual significance for everyone.

Sometime in 2008 Joe and I did end up reuniting, although marriage still seemed to be nowhere in sight. In order to understand several of the stories you are about to read, you need to know that as time began to pass and as I watched the years go by, I guess you could say I entered the desert once again. This time my idol worship didn’t revolve around the desire for a man but for purpose and a ministry, something that God went on to promise me later, as I wrote with that voice-recognition software. As I waited I eventually began to work for a Christian bookstore and also for my brother, whose elementary school field trip business was run out of my parents’ house. Although I was blessed to work for my brother and also alongside my good friend Melissa, who also worked for my brother, it was still hard at times because I longed for the fulfillment of all that God had shown me and had promised me. But still I waited.

Then, as I mentioned, in 2010, in the midst of my waiting, God called me to write yet another book, something that I hadn’t expected. What you are about to read is comprised mainly of stories that came about from this second book. And although this didn’t make sense to me at the time, why God would call me to write another book before my first writings were officially published or out there for the world to see in some way or before any promises were actually fulfilled, I obeyed.

I was inspired to call this new book Bridge Stories, a title I later came to find out held a lot of meaning. God had laid this phrase on my heart one day while I happened to be looking at an image of the old temple in the back of my Bible, staring at the big bridge connected to it. What God revealed to me, and the concept that was in my mind as I wrote what you are about to read, is that just as a bridge once connected Jerusalem with the Temple Mount, bringing people closer to the temple where God resided, these stories are meant to lead people into a deeper relationship with the Lord. They are meant to help you discover your own story—for God created everyone to testify. We were all meant to be a bridge that leads others to Christ.

It wasn’t until years later that God revealed even greater symbolism within the name Bridge Stories while I was looking at another type of bridge. This bridge happened to be the hyphenation that eventually existed within my last name. Since I already had part of my testimony out in the world under my maiden name, at first, after getting married, I was inspired to hyphenate my last name. While looking at this visual one day after these stories had been written, God laid another meaning of Bridge Stories on my heart. These were the stories that got me from His promise to His fulfillment—from my maiden name to my married name. And they are definitely stories that brought me even closer to the Lord. The waiting time can be sweet if we continue to focus on the Lord and trust in His faithfulness. So my desire and prayer for you, my friends, is that these stories will also bring you into a closer relationship with Jesus. He is our Bridegroom who, although He seems to be a long time coming, in God’s faithfulness will truly return for us all someday on the clouds.

CHAPTER TWO

God Provides

And my God will meet all your needs according to the riches of his glory in Christ Jesus.

—Philippians 4:19

W

henever I begin to doubt God’s provision, I find myself looking back to this recorded story from my life. A few years ago, the Lord gave me the opportunity to visit my brother in New York City. However, as much as I wanted to go, I really could not afford it. But because God wanted me to go, He provided. In one day I ended up gaining $200, the complete cost of the plane ticket, and it all came about in a rather amazing way.

One day while at a store, I reached into my wallet to grab a one-dollar bill only to find that there was a one-hundred-dollar bill in its place, and I hadn’t placed it there. I didn’t have a one-hundred-dollar bill. I then began to think about my transactions that day, and since I typically did not carry or use cash, I could not recall where I would have accidentally received a one-hundred-dollar bill. I was stumped.

Later that day I went to another store in a strip mall. After shopping I walked quite a distance back to my car, where I discovered three twenty-dollar bills lying right behind my car, almost under my car, and absolutely no one around to claim them. Again, I was stumped. I then got into my car and drove through the parking lot toward the exit, and as I drove, I noticed more money in the road, so I got out of my car and found myself picking up two more twenty-dollar bills, which brought my total from that parking lot to one hundred dollars. The one-hundred-dollar bill in my purse plus the one hundred dollars from the parking lot was $200, exactly enough to cover my plane ticket to New York City, which I ended up purchasing that day.

When I was actually in New York City, there was a moment when I really wanted to take a taxi because I was tired, but my brother didn’t want to spend the money. We eventually decided to take a taxi anyway, and as we were getting into the cab, I found a ten-dollar bill. God even paid for that taxi ride! He was definitely on a mission to prove to me that He provides where He leads.

I know that God orchestrated this story in my life to show me in a tangible way that if something is His will, then it is His bill. It worked, for when I start to doubt, this story of God’s provision always seems to come back into my mind. It is as if God said, I am capable of manifesting a one-hundred-dollar bill in your purse, and I can shower you with twenty-dollar bills. It is no big deal for Me. It is no big deal because God knows that money is just paper. It holds no value for Him, except as a means that He may choose to use to get us to where we need to be. He will provide where He leads. Let us all truly believe and testify.

CHAPTER THREE

God Thinks We Are Beautiful

Listen, daughter, and pay careful attention: Forget your people and your father’s house. Let the king be enthralled by your beauty; honor him, for he is your lord.

—Psalm 45:10–11

I

went to China a few years ago on a mission trip. While I was there, as happens a lot when I travel, I ended up retaining a lot of water, which didn’t help with the already low body image that I was struggling with at that time. One day some of our native Christian friends there ended up introducing my teammates and me to a doctor and professor working at the university where we were staying. He worked in Chinese medicine and, after noticing that I was bloated, mentioned that he had medicine that would help my metabolism. This intrigued me, so I made an appointment right then and there to purchase it from him the following day.

Like I said, I struggled with my body image a lot during that time in my life. Because of this, I had been hoping that I would lose a few pounds in China so that it would spur me on to continue to do so once I got back home, since this trip was physically challenging. However, as you can see, I ended up feeling as if I had gained weight while I was there instead. I really prayed over this medicine, though, about whether or not I should use it, and as I did, I began to struggle with confusion. I didn’t know what to do because I found myself able to validate my decision either way. Plus, I admit that I really wanted a quick fix. However, the following day, I finally prayed one last time, surrendering my confusion to the Lord and asking Him to show me what He wanted me to do. I knew that when I did this, it would then be His job to show me clearly.

The following day, I went to see this doctor only to find that he wasn’t there, that for some reason he had forgotten our appointment. They had no record that I was even supposed to see him. So I couldn’t help but to think to myself, Well, God cannot get any blunter than that, and in that moment, I decided not to pursue getting the medicine any longer.

I then went back to my dorm room, where I noticed that a note had been slipped under my door. The note read:

Susan, while we were praying tonight a thought popped into my head and it did not go away, so I think I am supposed to give it to you:

Susan, you are a very beautiful woman who I, God, am very pleased with. Your sentiment toward others is sweet and lovely. My fragrance follows you wherever you go. I take great delight in you. Focus on me, and I will reveal your beauty to you. You are treasured in my sight and a precious gem. I love you more than you know. Jesus

Wow! I had never experienced God putting a whole message on someone’s heart to give to me before, but I knew God used the body of Christ to speak, and I really valued this girl’s relationship with the Lord. Because of this, I did end up believing that those were Jesus’s words to me. In fact, I framed them so that they would be a constant reminder to me. I really needed that at that particular moment in time, and God has continued to bring me back to those framed words and to this recorded story whenever I have needed the reminder that my Ultimate Love thinks I am beautiful.

Thank You, Lord, for always seeing our true beauty!

CHAPTER FOUR

Live

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.

—John 10:10

O

ne day as I was sitting in front of my computer at work, feeling fatigued, like always, as well as concerned for my ears, which had been acting up, I found myself lifting these concerns to the Lord. His response to me was "Susan, live." I then went downstairs and began to talk with Melissa, my coworker and friend, and the first thing out of her mouth was an invitation to pray for someone else. She began to tell me about how the doctors had told this person that the reason why he wasn’t getting over a cold that he had had for a long time was because his immune system was poor. It was poor because he had suffered with cancer for many years and was still at that time undergoing chemotherapy.

We then began to talk about an upcoming trip that this man was taking and about our concern as to whether or not he should even go on this trip. But then Melissa replied that he wanted to go because he knew that if he stopped and slowed down, things would get worse. I could tell that this man was definitely a go-getter, so much so that God used his story to open my eyes. For God began to show me that my situation was nothing like his. He showed me that things could be much worse and that I needed to stop complaining.

I mean, there I was, complaining about my fatigue and my ear allergies, at thirty-five years of age, using this as an excuse to be complacent, and here was this man who was over seventy years old, with a poor immune system and cancer, pressing through to live life to the fullest. No wonder God told me to live. For God was pointing out that I could spend all of my time complaining about my rather insignificant health issues in terms of the big picture, or I could get up and continue to accomplish the mission that He had set before me, one that my minor health issues really were not hindering, even though I sometimes felt as if they were.

We are not made for this world. As God had even been pointing out to me at that time through the death of a friend the week before and through some meaningful verses that followed, our bodies will wear out and death will come. But we should not be afraid of this, for death is truly only the beginning if in fact we have accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as our personal Lord and Savior.

One of those verses that had become dear to my heart is a verse that my devotional happened to revolve around the day after my friend’s funeral. It was Psalm 116:15, which says, Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his faithful servants. What? God delights in our death? Well, why shouldn’t He? For even the apostle Paul said that to live is Christ but to die is gain (Phil. 1:21). Let me say that again: to live is Christ, but to die is gain.

God delights in our deaths because He knows that we were not made for this world. He knows that our entrance into heaven is our entrance into what we were really made for, a marriage to Christ for all eternity. But while we are still on earth, for a time such as this, He also wants us to live life to the fullest, and we do this by letting Christ live in us. Our lives on this earth are for one purpose and one purpose only, whether we are sitting at a desk all day long or overseas on a mission trip. It is to glorify God with all our strength.

So, Lord, help us all, like the apostle Paul and like this man with cancer, to press through. Help us to press through the momentary trials of this life and live. Please glorify Yourself through our weaknesses so that we may live for You all the days of our lives, up until the very end, when we go to be with You and enter into true living. What a day of abundance that will be! Praise God.

CHAPTER FIVE

Shine Like a Star

Do everything without grumbling or arguing, so that you may become blameless and pure, children of God without fault in a warped and crooked generation. Then you will shine among them like stars in the sky as you hold firmly to the word of life. And then I will be able to boast on the day of Christ that I did not run or labor in vain.

—Philippians 2:14–16

A

few Christmases ago, God taught me an important lesson. It is a lesson that He reminds me of every year at Christmas when I see my Christmas star lit up in my front window. Whenever I see that star, I remember that we were meant to shine, to shine Christ’s love from the inside out.

That Christmas I went to buy a movie for Joe, and as I went to check out at the register, I ended up behind an older gentleman. Seeing that all I had was one movie, he told me to go ahead of him. Are you sure? I asked, and he replied, Yes, for it is only me. He then joked that I could buy his cookies.

In that moment my heart really felt compassion for this man, and I began to hope that he really wasn’t just by himself. All I know is that I then found myself whispering to the female clerk that I wanted to buy his cookies. She was greatly taken aback and began asking me if I knew him, but I simply told her that he had joked with me. She then began to ring up my movie and his cookies and put them in a bag. All the while, neither of us knew whether the gentleman was attuned to what was happening or not. She, however, continued to be amazed, and I could tell that she had never seen anyone do what I was doing. So, sweetly and genuinely, she told me to have a merry Christmas.

Later I told Joe that that moment may have been more for the cashier than for the older gentleman. This was all the more reason why I found myself regretting that I hadn’t even once thought to look at her and say The love of Christ compels me, or something like that that would have given God the glory and pointed her to Him. I didn’t even have my silver cross necklace on in that moment, which was very rare for me.

The next morning, my devotional revolved around James 1:22–25. James says,

Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. Anyone who listens to the word but does not do what it says is like someone who looks at his face in a mirror and, after looking at himself, goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like. But whoever looks intently into the perfect law that gives freedom, and continues in it—not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it—they will be blessed in what they do.

What really stuck out to me was the inspirational that went along with this passage. It talked about how we as Christ followers are living observed lives; that others are watching us. Our concern for others is an expression of the compassion Christ displayed to the hurting. The devotional challenged us to put the love of Christ into practice in our everyday lives because a hurting world is watching us.

After reading that I once again started to think about that moment in the store and found myself again regretting not being able to look at that cashier and tell her something that pointed her to Christ. I began to believe that it wasn’t by accident that I didn’t even have my silver cross necklace on during that encounter, because I always had it on. It was extremely rare to find me without it, and yet in that one moment, it wasn’t there to speak for me.

I then started thinking about whether or not Christ would be able to shine through me without it, if it wasn’t there to speak for me like it had been once when I was in Japan and didn’t know the language. Back then, in order to witness to an older gentleman who didn’t speak English, I pointed to my cross necklace and then bowed, after he had bowed to the Buddhist shrine in his house to show me his tradition. If I didn’t have a physical cross anywhere on my body, would people still know that I was a Christian?

God then ended up bringing to my mind the fact that it had taken over a year for me to get around to putting new light bulbs into the light fixtures outside my house, and that although I finally had replaced them, that the day before, in order to save money, I had still turned them off right before I went to bed. This was something that I didn’t use to do. When I first moved into my house, I would leave them on all night in order to bring light to the darkness and to bless my neighbors. But the night before, even though they had new bulbs, I turned them off. Yet I began to see with this thought that I may have quenched the Holy Spirit, for I then remembered that as I was turning them off, I actually began to hear a still, small voice telling me that it was time to shine.

The revelation that followed was that maybe I couldn’t depend on tangible things to shine for me. My necklace, for instance, was just a symbol. Christ, however, is not. He is the Word. He is the Light. But I was now the Word made flesh, the Light, Christ in me. Was I shining? Was I truly reflecting Christ?

It was hard for me to think of never wearing my silver cross necklace again, but I began to think that maybe that was actually what I needed. Maybe if I didn’t wear it, I would be more conscious of the need to represent the Lord with my actions and words. I would be more conscious of the fact that it was I who needed to shine for people, more so than my necklace, for as Christ’s body, we are now the Word made flesh. We are His hands and feet and voice.

I then thought more about how I used to keep my outside house lights on, and all of a sudden, a strong desire grew within me to