“God combats evil with the power of maternal love.” -Edith Stein
“You’re not my real mom.”
The color drained from my cheeks at the shock of her remark. Seeing how sharply the comment hit its mark, she started laughing. “You’re not angry, are you?” she giggled.
“Angry?” I was rather stunned at her sudden remark in the middle of our dinner conversation. I had taken this struggling child out for a one-on-one and to get prayer from a priest because she had been asking for help with a confession she wanted to make. A confession of a horror no child should have to confess nor endure; nevertheless, she had blood on her hands and conscience and desperately wanted to be free. The meeting with the priest was remarkable. She left the session in tears of joy telling me, “This is the first time in my life I truly feel free, like the weight has lifted!” But an hour later, her demeanor and topic of conversation had changed dramatically. (I found out later she had run into an old ‘friend’ in the bathroom who was in a Satanic cult, and after this encounter with her ‘friend’ she was like a totally different person the rest of the night.)
“I’m not angry, but I’m sad. That really hurt,” I confessed tenderly.
“Why does that make you sad?” she laughed louder, as if mocking my love and pain altogether. “It’s not like you are a real mom. You didn’t give birth to anyone. And you spend all your time with the staff anyway,” she shrugged her shoulders matter-of-factly, as if I shouldn’t be hurt at her stabbing comment. In fact, she proceeded to then list all the things I was failing to do. I couldn’t believe my ears. Here I was, taking this child out on a 1-on-1 date, treating her to a delicious dinner, and she proceeds to insult me and my attempts to love her and the girls with a mother’s love.
I knew she didn’t really mean so much harm with her comment, but the enemy of my soul did, and he knew exactly where to hit. It reminds me of the Green Goblin in Spider-Man when he is convincing Norman Osborn to attack Peter Parker and says, “The heart, Osborn! First, we attack his heart.”
I’ve struggled a lot with believing I’m a good mom, often wondering when I will ever be enough. But this year in particular, I have grown so much and felt more balanced and secure in my calling as a mom than ever before. I’ve labored and labored to build this ministry and keep it growing, and we’ve hired more staff than I imagined. Having to manage the staff, train, equip, grow, convict, form, etc. has been absolutely demanding and the stress of it has taken its toll on my physical health this year. But my motherhood has remained intact, impeccable and producing fruit. So to hear from a child I was intentionally investing in that I am not her real mom and pretty much never will be good enough as one, it crushed me. I had to sort through my emotions and thoughts later, battling with the war of pain that I am still rejected by the girls for whom I gave up my entire life, while also acknowledging the child was projecting her pain onto me from her own birth mother. In fact, she had asked me earlier, “How could a mom abandon her child? I just can’t understand that.”
Naturally, the pain the girls harbor at their birth mothers are often spewed out at me. I just have to keep reminding myself who the real enemy is (like Finnick tells Katniss in The Hunger Games), and to not take offense at insult to injury. But my biggest battle was yet to come.
Have you ever heard a demon laugh? It’s a repulsive sound. It was a mocking, cackling giggle that still grates on my heart. Another child, who had been dedicated to Satan as a baby (and who willingly still serves him today), was sharing with me the details of her past, her mother who dedicated her/sacrificed her to the prince of darkness, and the horrors she grew up to endure. She began crying and sobbing in my arms. As I comforted her, I whispered prayers of healing and blessing over her. But the evil spirits inside of her did not want to hear any such blessing, as they are tortured by such, so they began manifesting. (Yes, demons are real and yes I’ve encountered this multiple times now, and someday maybe I’ll share more detail of what all these demonic encounters entail, but for now, most people don’t believe – don’t want to believe – that this is real and so I often keep the details to those who do understand instead. But here's a summary...)
The child’s eyes rolled back and she went unconscious as a different voice and spirit took over; she began growling and then screaming and then quieted down and began laughing. Laughing at me and mocking my love for this child. “Heh heh heh,” the evil voice cackled, eyes closed but sticking her tongue out, giving me the middle finger, and violently rejecting the prayers, songs, and blessings we said. The manifestation turned violent and I had to call for back up, I was hurt in the process, but hours of prayer and worship disarmed the powers of darkness. At one point, I sat on the floor and as I prayed I wept, spiritually caught up in the moment of battling for all my children. As I cried out to God to intervene, I saw a vision of Mother Mary coming to minister to me; she took my hands in hers and prayed with me. Then the child who was still manifesting on the floor began army-crawling over to me. She crawled into my lap and as I held her, I saw not me holding her, but Mother Mary herself, cradling her daughter and healing her of the demonic influences in and around her. A birth mother who dedicated her to Satan, but a spiritual Mother who brings her to Jesus. The child then began crying silently and opened her eyes, became conscious and aware of what had happened, and she clung to me as I held her like my own child.
Afterwards, the battle wounds were aching and later that night as I tried to sleep, I kept hearing the cackling and mocking voices trying to haunt me still. I wondered why God would allow such, but the scene of Jesus’ crucifixion quickly took form and I remembered how Jesus himself was mocked, ridiculed, spit on, abused, and then murdered. Yet, He did not withhold His love. He did not shrink back. God, who did not even spare His own Son, knew that love is enough – love can conquer any evil, love can cover any insult, love can heal any injury.
The Love of a mother is something extraordinary. (Which is why the lack of one can be so deadly.) I often struggle with a Moses-complex and ask God why He chose me because many times I feel far too inadequate for the life he continues to call me deeper into. But I wonder if He chose me because of my own mother and her extraordinary love. I love fiercely and deeply because my mother fiercely and deeply loves. But these girls have to grow up without having experienced that love as a baby, a child, a teenager. I think He chose me because the love of my mother and grandmother and generations past has set me up to give the kind of motherly love these girls desperately need. To start new generations of love and blessings! It’s not my own strength, but because I have the Queen of Motherhood as my advocate in heaven and my amazing mother in the flesh on earth.
And then…because of God’s great love for me, He never leaves me with an insult or discouragement but always finds a way to speak to my heart. I opened up my morning devotion to find a love letter Lucia snuck in for me. “I love you so much, Mom. I just want you to know that I love you and that you are loved by the most high God created you to be the right mom to me.”
“God combats evil with the power of maternal love.” -E. Stein
P.S. I’ve included a poem I wrote about my mom for Mother’s Day in 2008 just to show how special she is, and how her love has set me up to be the mother I am today. Thank you, Mom!
