God Works in the Shadows: A Quarter Tank of Gas to a Smile

By Bonita King

Bonita was a mere twenty-year-old going to a singles' conference in New Orleans, Louisiana, with her sister and a friend to enjoy the fellowship of single fellow believers. Little did she know it would change her life forever. By seeming happenstance, her friend found a group to go out to eat with after the evening service of the opening night. She happened to sit across from a twenty-five-year-old man from a church in Florida who captured her attention. After many prayers and confirmations from God, she moved four hundred miles away from all she had known and married the man she had only known two months and three weeks. It was the beginning of an eventful twenty-year journey of sorrows and many miracles and a great love story.

He had his own struggles from his childhood, and she had hers. Together and with their God-centered marriage and home, they dealt with it all and walked into the unknown trusting that God really did know what he was doing. Stephen, her husband, had an auto accident at thirty-two years of age and after eight years of marriage. Then God gave them a surprise one year later in the form of a beautiful, bright-eyed son with Asperger's (autism), ADHD, OCD, Tourette's, and severe food allergies.

This story is full of needs, dreams, scriptures, words from the Lord, and miracles that sustained them on that God-ordained journey that followed. They dealt with all that God had allowed into their lives through their difficulties, trusted God every day, and watched as miracle after miracle unfolded to provide for their every need. Twenty years later, the strength gained from that journey gave Bonita the fuel needed to continue into her new journey as a single mother after Stephen's death at the age of forty-six.

21

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 3, 2023
• ISBN: 9781098091996

Book preview

cover.jpg

God Works in the Shadows

A Quarter Tank of Gas to a Smile

Bonita King

ISBN 978-1-0980-9198-9 (paperback)

ISBN 978-1-0980-9199-6 (digital)

Copyright © 2023 by Bonita King

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods without the prior written permission of the publisher. For permission requests, solicit the publisher via the address below.

Christian Faith Publishing

832 Park Avenue

Meadville, PA 16335

www.christianfaithpublishing.com

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Preface

When and Where It All Began

The Good Years

The Bad Years

Miracles

More Miracles

The Dream and the Mountain

2004

Dreams and Shadows

More Dreams and Shadows

One Last Miracle

Cost and Benefits

Beauty of a New Day

About the Author

To Gloria Tuminello

I will always love you! You were the first person to believe in me when I looked like a scared, backward little teenage girl with no future. You were the first person to ever invest in me, and I am forever changed by your love and your efforts.

In memory of Stephen Todd

You helped put me back together. You taught me to be strong and always believed I could do anything. You taught me to keep silent when I wanted to speak and to speak when I wanted to keep silent.

To the First Pentecostal Church of Pensacola, Florida

You were the place where I found my healing, the place where I learned a passion for the Word, the place where I lost my song, and the place where I got it back again. You taught me to fly.

To Gregory King

You are God's design for a better life. Thank you for being a man of highest character and complete dedication to the Word of God, the Bible. You took on a great challenge when you married me, but you are up to the task. Here's to an amazing future together!

Preface

God Deals with Us in the Shadows

This earthly place seems so solid, so real. We can see with our eyes. We can touch with our hands. We see, feel, touch, hear; everything is so tangible that it seems real.

We can't see heaven or angels unless God gives us a supernatural visual visitation and the momentary ability to see them. Therefore, the things of the eternal, the supernatural, manifest as clouds, shadows, hints.

Things are not always as they seem. I propose that heaven and the things of the supernatural are the real; this earthly life is but a shadow of that heavenly, real realm.

The Lord's Prayer begins, "After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven" (Matthew 6:9–10, emphasis mine). Notice the order. God's will must first be done in heaven before it can be done on earth. We are to pray into existence on earth the things that already are in heaven. Therefore, heaven is real and earth is but the shadow. Heaven is the reality, and earth the fuzzy, clouded copy of the reality that is to come. This earthly existence is the preshow before the main event. We as humans, however, are limited by time and space; it was created for us. God is not limited. He is outside of time—eternal. All of this temporal earthly existence will pass away.

As C. S. Lewis said, We live in the shadowlands. Eternal things are not always clear and not easily seen by our humanity, for our earthly existence is but a shadow of what is real. Often the visions, dreams, sights, and sounds we receive from God are not as clear as one may think because we are so bound by the temporal, by this time and this space.

1 Corinthians 13:12 says, For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known. Life experiences are viewed through a mirror as dim types and shadows, as faint pictures, in an obscure manner, through a veil. We only see part. We are limited by our earthly vessels. Many of the Old Testament and New Testament figures saw dreams and visions, and many times they were unclear. We dissect prophecy, but we often only understand it after its fulfillment.

As we walk in our search for relationship with this mighty God, Jesus Christ, we seek his knowledge, understanding, heart, mind, and image. Things are not always clear, always perfect, always known. We misjudge, misunderstand, and sometimes become greatly disappointed when our expectations are not met. However, if we can understand that we are only seeing these things in part, through a veil, we will know that only in the successes and disappointments, misunderstandings and misjudgments, can we truly know the breadth of his grace and love for us. One day we will know in full, so it is okay to misread and get disappointed. His grace will carry us through, and we will become stronger, gentler, and more dependent on God.

When and Where It All Began

It was Friday night of Labor Day weekend 2011, and I realized that twenty-one years ago yesterday, I met Stephen Garrett Todd at Solo Flight Singles' Conference in New Orleans! That started a whirlwind romance, engagement, and God-destined marriage full of desperation and miracles. It was more painful than I could have imagined, more fulfilling than I could have expected, and more glorious than I ever dreamed possible.

Anita (my twin sister) and I loved going to apostolic singles' conferences because in those services there was such a freedom to worship and a heavy spirit and anointing of God like we had never experienced before. We had attended Solo Flight in 1989, but this year, 1990, was decidedly different. Destiny waited for us.

Anita, Robin (a friend from church), and I drove from Memphis, Tennessee, to New Orleans, Louisiana, on Thursday, August 30, 1990, for my second year at Solo Flight. We rushed into our hotel and threw on church clothes. I knotted my hair up, wrapped a large black scarf around it, and tied it in a huge bow, and off to church we went.

The service was just as amazing and awesome as we expected, maybe even more so. The Spirit of God permeated that hotel meeting room. There was such a freedom of unbound worship that came from hundreds of like-minded singles hungering for more of God. It was an incredible joy to have the privilege of being there.

In the rush of the day, I had not had a chance to think about having no one to go out to eat with after the service, but after service, Robin, our very bold friend, found a singles group to go out to eat with. They were from First Pentecostal Church (FPC) in Pensacola, Florida. At the restaurant, I happened to sit opposite a big intriguing redheaded young man (Stephen Todd) who caught my attention as I watched him sip his Perrier. He sat across from a flirty, beautiful young lady who was beginning to catch his attention.

The next day, Stephen went to the zoo with his friend and some girls from Mobile, Alabama (incredulous to me), instead of sessions while I went to the day sessions. I will never forget the sermon, The Earmark of Love. I found at that conference the freedom and fellowship with God that my soul longed for so badly. This was a new world for me. I wanted to drink in every single drop I could from that conference, while Stephen was there to get a break as he was in the middle of a job change, which had left him so broke he almost didn't attend. But the speaker, Rev. Lee Stoneking, had piqued his curiosity when trying to say something to him the previous year, so he went anyway.

We sat with the group from First Pentecostal Church of Pensacola every night after that first night. Stephen and I talked some during the conference, but he mostly talked to my twin sister, Anita, because God had given him a sense in the Spirit that she needed God to minister to her desperately. He and I did sit by each other during every evening service and at every restaurant after service; however, I spoke mostly to his friend Daniel. As we were twins, Stephen had a little difficulty distinguishing which one was me for about a day. It took him about a day to figure out who he was talking to, but when he did, the sparks began to fly.

He never forgot the dress I wore and how he felt when he grabbed my hand as we were instructed to do by the person speaking at that time. He never forgot the thrill when I accidentally bumped up against his side. The seats were small and the crowd packed tightly together. God was beginning to awaken in him something he had successfully buried and determined to ignore.

We started spending our days together at the conference as well as evenings at the services. I worshipped and danced with a greater freedom than I had ever experienced in my life. It was exhilarating! Stephen thought I was beautiful, but really took notice of my free, passionate worship. That was quite an encouraging sign for him. If I had not been a worshipper, he would not have taken as much notice of me. My beauty got his first glance, but my passionate worship kept his gaze.

He had already been through wild college dormitory life, so he avoided dating most young ladies after getting into the church at twenty-two years of age. He would pray about dating someone, and God would quickly show him in some odd way that it was not his will. I also had always prayed about dating. I believed God had someone specific for me that was in his perfect will, and there was no point in much dating until that person appeared.

Stephen and I did not talk exclusively to each other but did spend enough time together, even if the communication was unspoken. Daniel, another member of the FPC single's group, and I exchanged information as he wanted to write me. Stephen got Anita's address because he wanted to send some preaching videos to her that he felt in the Holy Spirit she desperately needed. Still, the unspoken attraction, the chemistry was there. Stephen was bigger than life and most intriguing to me, and I had sparked something inside him that made him come alive in a surprising way. Besides, how else could we go to their first planned singles' conference in Pensacola the next year if we didn't keep in contact? Little did we know what was in store.

After he had come into