Have you ever felt alone and forgotten?

HAVE YOU EVER FELT ALONE AND FORGOTTEN?  I sure have – many times, over the course of my life!  Not only have I often “felt alone and forgotten,” but also “alone and different.”

The reason I am writing this is because this morning, my husband Tom and I (during our daily reading) landed on Psalm 88, which brought back some powerful memories for me – especially the following verses:

PSALM 88:  ⁽⁸⁾ You separated me from my close friends, made me repulsive to them; I am caged in, with no escape; ^10 (9) my eyes grow dim from suffering. I call on you, Adonai, every day; I spread out my hands to you.  ^11 (10) Will you perform wonders for the dead? Can the ghosts of the dead rise up and praise you? (Selah)

 ^12 (11) Will your grace be declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in Abaddon? (Hebrew idiom meaning "destruction", "doom.") ^13 (12) Will your wonders be known in the dark, or your righteousness in the land of oblivion? ^14 (13) But I cry out to you, Adonai; my prayer comes before you in the morning. ^15 (14) So why, Adonai, do you reject me? Why do you hide your face from me? (CJB)

These passages hit me so hard because I’ve done a lot of suffering over the course of my life; and – even though God HAD performed some amazing miracles for me – I often wondered where He was during my times of distress, because it sometimes seemed like He was busy ignoring, and even outright rejecting me!

Basically, for me, feeling “alone and forgotten and/or different,” had been a way of life …UNTIL – to my great surprise - in January of 1995 at age 44, He saw fit to open my “spiritual eyes” to Him, His Messiah, and His Word. 

On that wondrous day, I “happened” to be sitting in the pews of a little Baptist Church in Seymour, Missouri, on my first date with a man named Ellis, whom I’d met at an “Oldies Dance” some months before. Ellis had asked me out a few times before but, until that cold day in January, I had refused because – well, to put it bluntly – he was a “Bible Thumper,” constantly talking about Jesus, even while we were dancing!   

(Up until then, I really wasn’t into “that kind” of Christian, because I had always been under the impression that Christians were all hypocrites, sinning during the week, and then warming the pews on Sundays…)

Anyway, the ONLY reason I had finally decided to go on a date with him was because on that particular New Year’s Eve of 1994/1995, I had been lying in bed after yet another disastrous date – and with hands folded in prayer, I heard myself say, “Dear God, I’m so TIRED of my life!  Please – if you’re as sick and tired of my life and lifestyle as I am, could you PLEASE give me a GOOD man for a change?”

Throughout my life, I had always chosen the “rugged/tough/macho” type guys, and so I thought that turning to God and asking for a “good” man MIGHT solve all my problems.  (Okay  -  just so you know  -  God DID answer my prayer the very next day; but imagine my surprise to ultimately discover that that “man” would end up being JESUS!)  

Here's what happened:

This "weird" new phase of my life began the next morning on January 1, when I received a phone call from the “Bible thumper” calling to ask me out again!  His words were something to the effect of, “I don’t really know why I’m calling you, Carmen, but I feel like God wants me to give you another chance to go out with me.”

Well, my first inclination, of course, was to tell him “No!” again – but then I remembered my one-way conversation with God the night before … and the bottom line was, I reluctantly accepted Ellis’ invitation to join him in his church on the following Sunday.

 …And  so I found myself on a date with a CHRISTIAN – sitting in a church of all places – listening to a pastor who “just happened” to say “all the right things” that I had obviously needed to hear…

At some point, all of a sudden, BAM! I felt as as though I had been hit by a lightening bolt – only it didn’t hurt.   All I knew was that “something” had "touched me all over, right down to the core of my very being.  

I suddenly felt as though my eyes had been opened to something amazing – something I couldn’t explain, but my mind "knew things" and I "just knew" there was a lot more, and that my life would never be the same again!  Over the course of my life, God had given me MANY miracles, and so I had always KNOWN He was real … but that morning absolutely blew my mind, and I’ve never been the same.  (THANK YOU, Father!)

Anyway, the next thing I knew, I was busy reading the Bible from cover to cover, attending every Bible study I could find, and doing every workbook I could get my hands on. Over the coming months, everything began to “click” and fall into place … and it dawned on me that THIS is where I was meant to be at that time, because God clearly had me on a journey to discover “who” I was ultimately meant to be!

Approximately a year into my new walk, I started “hearing” Him tell me to move to Colorado Springs – but, having nightmarish childhood memories of that place, I fought Him like crazy for six months until one day my eyes “happened” upon the passages in Deuteronomy 1:6 and 2:3, which felt like they were written just for me; and I “felt” as if God was telling me, “Carmen, you’ve been at this mountain long enough!”

And so, I put my house on the market and sold everything I owned (except, of course, for my car), and moved to Colorado Springs … something which changed my entire life and led me right to where HE had ALWAYS wanted me, walking in Torah, and showing others the Way!

Backing up to Psalm 88, which I mentioned at the beginning of this article, the words struck me so hard because I HAD lost friends over my newly-found faith. After I became a Christian, some began to distance themselves from me, refusing to tell me why, while others had the guts to let me know that it was because I had “changed.”  They said things like, “Carmen, you’re not the same person.  You’re not as much fun as you used to be, and you talk differently.  You're just ... different!”

Although it had hurt at the time, I had to admit, it was true.  I had started the habit of going to church on Sunday, I no longer found any pleasure in hanging out in bars anymore, and my way of speaking changed because I was no longer “in the world.” 

For me, “having a good time” meant hanging out with my new, like-minded church friends and doing Bible studies. I had stopped looking for “husband material” in every man I met; and ALL that really mattered to me was that “I belonged to Jesus.”  In other words, I had become … well … a Bible Thumper!

And I'm here to tell you -  this situation was magnified exponentially when Yahweh opened my spiritual eyes to the idea of YHWH/Yeshua/Torah!  People began to scatter (and they still do) in every direction whenever I mentioned that I was “Messianic”; as they were under the erroneous belief that I had “gone back under the law”… Unfortunately, this still holds true today, nearly 30 years later, because most people simply CANNOT comprehend what it means to be Torah observant.

I’ve gotten used to it, though.  And while I still feel “different,” I no longer feel “alone” or “forgotten” because I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that The Holy One of Israel is WITH me – no matter what “the world” thinks.  His Plan for me all along was to “sow seeds” for His Truth wherever and however I can – and I’m good with that!

 

America has gone crazy!

AMERICA HAS GONE CRAZY! It is the only country in the world where “mass shootings” are constantly perpetrated by ordinary citizens, and – from what the Bible tells us – the “crazy” will NOT end until Yeshua returns...

The latest incident happened yesterday (April 17, 2025) when a Florida State University student (the son of a local sheriff’s deputy) killed two people and injured five others in a shooting at the university. A young man with a turbulent past, he is reported to have exhibited “White Supremacist values"…

Honestly, folks, I am left shaking my head about anyone with "White Supremacist values" because, not only are those people blind to the fact that יְהוָֹה (The Holy One of Israel - Yahweh, ADONAI ELOHIM) created people of all races and colors; but they are totally ignorant of the fact that MOST of the world is NOT “white”. I'd like to know WHAT, exactly, supposedly makes the White race superior?

Galatians 3:26 For in union with the Messiah, you are all children of God through this trusting faithfulness; 27 because as many of you as were immersed into the Messiah have clothed yourselves with the Messiah, in whom 28 there is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor freeman, neither male nor female; for in union with the Messiah Yeshua, you are all one. 29 Also, if you belong to the Messiah, you are seed of Avraham and heirs according to the promise. (CJB)

(Pay special attention to the words in verse 28 that say: "... for in union with the Messiah Yeshua, you are all one.")

Could it be ANY CLEARER that NO race, creed or color is "supreme" over another? Anyone who thinks otherwise needs to GROW A BRAIN, snap out of it, and get INTO the Bible while there's still time, because Yeshua's return will happen one day:

1 Corinthians 15:51 Look, I will tell you a secret — not all of us will die! But we will all be changed! 52 It will take but a moment, the blink of an eye, at the final shofar. For the shofar will sound, and the dead will be raised to live forever, and we too will be changed.

53 For this material which can decay must be clothed with imperishability, this which is mortal must be clothed with immortality. 54 When what decays puts on imperishability and what is mortal puts on immortality, then this passage in the Tanakh will be fulfilled: “Death is swallowed up in victory. 55 “Death, where is your victory? Death, where is your sting?”

56 The sting of death is sin; and sin draws its power from the Torah; 57 but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah! 58 So, my dear brothers, stand firm and immovable, always doing the Lord’s work as vigorously as you can, knowing that united with the Lord your efforts are not in vain. (CJB)

As far as I'm concerned, the return of Yeshua cannot come soon enough! However, until then, we must realize that the Bible tells us what people will be like in the end times, and that those who endure until the end will be saved/delivered (Matthew 24:13).

2 Timothy 3:1-5 But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people.

Have you ever responded to God's Will with a really hesitant or difficult "Yes"?

Have you ever responded to God's Will with a really hesitant or difficult "Yes"?  I certainly have - and if you have, too, please feel free to share your experience here, stating what you felt He wanted you to do, and what the outcome/end result was.

I'll kick things off by sharing my own story:

One of the hardest decisions of my life was God's command to sell all my possessions, leave all my friends (I had no family), and move from Seymour, Missouri (near Springfield) to Colorado Springs – a place I NEVER wanted to see again due to some severe childhood traumas involving endless sexual abuse by my adoptive father, beginning at age 10, before he retired from the Army at Fort Carson.

Anyway, it was 1996 and I was 45 when I first "heard" those words droning on in my mind on a daily basis for at least six months:  “Move to Colorado Springs!”  I was still a "baby Christian," just a year into my walk with “Jesus” - and when I heard those words, all I could think of was: "This CANNOT be from God, because He KNOWS what happened in Colorado Springs!  Why would He do this to me?”

I fought Him for at least six months before surrendering; and the ONLY reason I gave in was because during that time, I just “happened” to be studying the workbook, Experiencing God, which included this mind-blowing thought:  “Whenever God leads you to a God-sized task, it always leads you to a crisis of belief – and what you do about it, reveals how you really feel about God.”

Long story short, I LOVED GOD, and so (being young in my walk at the time), I made a deal with Him, which was that I would move to Colorado Springs for a year, and if nothing good happened for me there, I fully intended to return to Springfield Missouri.

So, I sold all my furniture and most possessions, and put my house on the market; packed my dog and some personal possessions into a U-Haul trailer, and moved to Colorado Springs, not knowing what to expect.

It was a hard year, in part, because I couldn’t find a decent job, and nobody wanted to be friends with a middle-aged single woman, as most people my age were married. (I was a retired Army journalist, and thankfully I had a military pension to help me survive!) Even the Baptist church I attended left me feeling “excluded.”  Not only that, but I kept feeling like “something was missing” in Christians churches – but I, being new to the Bible, I really couldn’t figure out what it was that I was missing... 

Be that as it may, the only good thing that happened during that time was that I had finished the year-long Bible study my pastor had given me before I left Missouri, which certainly gave me a better understanding of exactly WHO I was serving…

One Sunday morning, after church in May 1997, feeling lonely, empty and disheartened, I found myself sitting in my car, crying, because my life was seemingly at a standstill.  I had reached the proverbial “end of my rope” in that unfriendly city, and I couldn’t stop myself from yelling at God, demanding to know WHY He had done this to me; after all, I had done everything He wanted me to, and NOTHING was happening.

I was lonely, basically broke and very unhappy; and so I told Him I must have misheard him back in Missouri, and that I was DONE with this nonsense, and planned to move back to Missouri as soon as my rental contract was up, because I couldn’t take it anymore. 

Well, as you know, God sometimes makes us wait until we get to that point of brokenness – but He obviously heard me because the very next morning, I received a surprise call from the Colorado Springs Business Journal (which also produced the Pueblo, Colorado and Madison, Wisconsin Business Journals), informing me that they wanted to hire me as the new Associate Editor! 

My first thought was: “But I wanna go back to Missouri” … however, I quickly remembered that God had obviously told me to move here for a reason, although I couldn’t figure out for the life of me WHAT that reason could be, and so I ultimately decided I’d better stay put.

Anyway, from that day on, events began to move more rapidly, and the bottom line is, MANY great things occurred BECAUSE I had obeyed HIS Will, and not gone my own way!

First - although my pastor in Missouri had warned me to make sure I remained a faithful Baptist - in the spring of 1997, I started attending an Assemblies of God Church where, two years in a row, I ended up becoming a summer camp counselor for abused and neglected children.

While acting in the capacity of counselor, I honestly don’t know who was healed the most during that week-long camp; me or the kids, as the experience served to heal my own childhood wounds from the inside-out!  

Through that same church, in 2008, God saw fit to allow me to become a mentor in a prison ministry called “Friends in Transition,” where, once a month, I went into the Women’s Prison in Canon City, Colorado, to mentor two women I was paired with over the course of  five years. 

I felt at the time, that perhaps these two worthy causes must have been why God sent me to Colorado; but no – there was a WHOLE lot more to come!

Please read on.

In 1998, although journalism has always been my first love, due to some strange circumstances (led by ADONAI), I stayed with the Business Journal for only a year, and ended up working as a contractor to US Air Force Space Command doing administrative work in their Classified Documents Library. 

It was there I met a man who told me he was a “Messianic Jew” who invited me to the Wednesday evening Torah studies presented by a Messianic Rabbi from Denver.  Well, praise ADONAI - those studies answered ALL of my questions as to why I felt “something was missing in Christian circles! 

As a German-born Jewish girl, my transformation to Messianic Judaism was immediate; it “felt right”; it was HOME – I didn’t have to (and wasn’t about to!) give up Jesus, whose given, Hebrew Name I learned was Yeshua. I was convinced that THIS was the REAL REASON, God caused me to move to Colorado, and it may have been - but as it turned out, there was more to come…  (BTW, this all happened around Passover of 1998.)

Backing up a bit, I had given up dating after left Missouri, because I could never pick “good men.”  Recognizing that God was giving me a “second chance” in life, I had wholeheartedly given my heart to Jesus, and I told him that if he wanted me to find another husband, HE would have to drop him in my lap.

Well, he did exactly that around Sukkot, the following year in 1999.   Still at Space Command in September 1999, I met my future husband, US Air Force (Retired) Lt. Col. William (Bill) Welker, who was working as a Computer, GPS and Satellite Security Engineer.

I led Bill to Torah, and we were married seven months later, in 2000 (under a “chupa” in the Messianic synagogue to which we ultimately belonged for 8 years), pledging our lives to YHWH/Yeshua/Torah!

In 2001, due to severe neck issues that required surgery (plus, my ever-growing perfume allergies which left me feeling every day like I had the flu), Bill urged me to quit work and stay home.  Having never NOT worked, I didn’t know what to do with myself, and began to pray for guidance.

And that is when God FINALLY showed me what His ultimate goal for me was:  I was to create a website revealing Torah to Christians; Yeshua to Jews; and God to all the world’s atheists. He had me call my ministry The Refiner’s Fire (therefinersfire.org), which has never had any “donate” buttons, because I wasn’t interested in using it for profit.

Since those early days, The Holy One of Israel kept “growing” Bill and me – and together, as a team constantly studying Scripture (and with Bill’s expertise in astronomy and calendar issues), God caused The Refiner’s Fire to flourish as a Messianic Apologetics Ministry.

In 2007, Yahweh dropped into my lap the privilege of working on the Aramaic English New Testament; and caused me to write several books of my own, including my best seller, Should Christians be Torah Observant.

And more recently, God has allowed me the privilege of becoming an Associate Professor at the Messianic Jewish Rabbinate, the online yeshiva from which I graduated in 2017. To this very day, I continue to do my daily work for God by reaching the world for YHWH/Yeshua/Torah via the Internet!

I thought my life was over when Bill passed away in 2021; but Yahweh gave me a new Torah-observant husband named Thomas Leannah a year and a half later, via some really unusual circumstances (which is a whole ‘nuther story!), and together, we are continuing to run The Refiner’s Fire.  (Please read our About Us page: https://therefinersfire.org/who_we_are.htm )

All those things happened because of my willingness to obey God, nearly three decades ago, back in 1996. They serve as PROOF that He is faithful to those who are His.  Sometimes, it takes a while to find out exactly what He wants us to do, but as long as we ask Him to keep us on His Path, we will eventually get there.