Some of you readers knew my Mom personally when she was alive, so you will know how close she and I were. Mom was one of the most Godly women I ever knew. Next to my Papaw (Mom's Dad), she was also the most faithful, fervent prayer warrior I ever knew. Was Mom perfect? Not by a long shot. Mom struggled in her walk with the Lord very much, just like every other Christian who ever lived. But Mom loved Jesus with all her heart, soul, mind, and strength, and she had a very soft spot in her heart for Him. She would often cry when she and I would be talking about Him or when she thought of heaven and all the loved ones she had waiting for her there. She went to be with Jesus, the One she loved so dearly, on April 28, 2012.
I've been missing her more than usual lately. It may sound dramatic and overstated, but this year, 2026, has honestly been the worst year of my entire life, health-wise. I got sick on December 24th, 2025, while sitting in our living room watching Zach open his Christmas gifts from Kevin and me, and outside of a few short-lived reprieves here and there, I have battled multiple afflictions ever since—not at varying times, but all at once. It has truly been like a nightmare having multiple severe trials and afflictions happening at the same time. There have been so many moments when I have been tried and tested past the point of what I felt I could bear, when I cried out to God from the depths of my soul, only for it to feel like the heavens were brass and He was so far away from me. The testing has been intense, and the spiritual warfare has been beyond what I have ever encountered—and that's saying something—that's actually saying a lot. The only way I can describe what I am feeling right now is to share with you the words I sent to a dear friend the other day. "I feel like God has dropped me off and left me here." That says it all. And I have to wonder. Has He? Has God dropped me off and left me here? Is He even listening to me? Does He see me? Does He see this?
Perhaps you can relate? Maybe you are in a long-lasting severe time of testing, too. If so, I hope you can find encouragement in knowing you are not alone.
As I cried out to Him the other day, I reminded Him of Matthew 7:7-11, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: for every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?"
I said, "Lord, if Zach came to me, so distraught and distressed, and was begging me for relief, and I had the power to heal him and alleviate his suffering, there is no way on earth I would tell him no. I would do anything and everything I could to relieve his anguish. I would never turn him away or allow him to go on in such a state if I could make it better. If he asked me for bread, I would never give him a stone. If he asked me for a fish, there is no way on earth I would give him a serpent!"
During so many moments of complete and total desperation, I have longed with all my heart to talk to Mom. To ask her to pray for me. To tell her all I am going through. To hear her say the familiar things she used to say to me when I was at my wit's end.
The way Mom handled me, spiritually, while she was living, was extremely difficult for me. In my most agonizing moments, when I was walking through such fiery trials, it could feel like Mom was extraordinarily hard on me. When it came to my spiritual life, Mom didn't cut me much any slack. At all. I would call her in tears, telling her, "Mom, I can't take this anymore. I can't take anymore!" and she would very calmly say these things to me.
"Cheryl, the Bible says, 'If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.'" Proverbs 24:10
"Cheryl, the Bible says, 'If thou hast run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee, then how canst thou contend with horses?'" Jeremiah 12:5
"Cheryl, the Bible says, 'Beloved, think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you, as though some strange thing happened unto you.'" I Peter 4:12
"Cheryl, God doesn't always heal instantly. Sometimes, He heals gradually."
"Cheryl, God has His own timetable."
Mom had a way of forcing me to pick myself up by the bootstraps regardless how bad I did not want to do that. I came to her so often, wanting empathy, understanding, someone to tell me it was okay to feel the way I was feeling. Mom always told me what I needed to hear, not what I wanted to hear. Looking back, it was like she had this deep-seated fear that I was going to walk away from the faith, go out into the world, and completely give up on God. I think one of the worst fears of her life was that I would backslide and no longer walk with Jesus. What Mom never did seem to see was that I had that same element in me—the one she and my Daddy instilled in me so deep I couldn't get away from it if I tried—that the Apostle Paul had in him when he wrote these words in 2 Corinthians 5:14, "For the love of Christ constraineth us." In this verse, the word "constrain" in the original Greek means: to hold together, to compel, to press, to keep in, to be taken with. The deep love for Jesus that my parents instilled in me since the day I was born compels me. It holds me fast. It makes it necessary for me to do certain things and live my life a certain kind of way.
Mom and Dad brought me up in a house according to Acts 16:13, where "prayer was wont to be made." Every night, all three of us would gather in the living room, and each of us would pray out loud together. Prayer was our first resource, not the last resort, in our household. To this day, prayer is the very first thing I reach for in every moment of trouble, distress, trial, or physical affliction.
Mom and Dad followed Ephesians 6:4: "And, ye fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." And Proverbs 22:6: "Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it." This is my Godly legacy. This is the way I was raised. These are the things that do not leave you—when you become an adult, when you are in trouble, when you are terrified, when you feel you can't take one more step or deal with things a second longer. When these things are stamped on your soul from the very first moment your mind can remember, you do not depart from them. Ever. They shape and mold your worldview and every single thing about your character, belief system, and the way you live your life.
My testimony is—"The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage." Proverbs 16:6. I do not say this boastfully. Believe me, I am profoundly grateful to the Lord for allowing me to be born and raised, the daughter of my precious Christian parents and the granddaughter of William McCoy.
So, unbeknownst to Mom, her worries about me throwing in the towel and walking away from the God she herself had taught me to love so intensely were the most futile worries of her life. As much as she worried about it, it makes me sad because every single one of those worries was completely in vain, and her life would have been much happier and more carefree if she had never wasted all that time and energy on being afraid I would choose a different life path.
Without dying and going to heaven anytime soon, I so wish I could talk to her now. But even as I wish this with all my heart, I already know what she would tell me in my current circumstances.
"Cheryl, keep pressing on. I want you to keep the faith. Heaven will surely be worth it all. Jesus will never turn His back on you. There's a great cloud of witnesses up here, cheering you on—your Papaw, your Mimmie, your Daddy, and me, along with so many other saints. You don't want to miss this. God is going to bring you through all this. All those prayers your Daddy and I prayed for you are still going up before the throne. God heard them. He is answering them every day in your, Kevin's, and Zach's lives. He won't fail you. All those things your Daddy and I taught you about heaven were true. I want you to keep being faithful. Don't compromise or let down the standard. Don't let go of the things your Daddy and I instilled in you. I know you're suffering. I know the battles have been long and hard to win. Your life isn't over. God still has work for you to do. Remember that one particular day I called and told you God had given me a Scripture to give to you? It always sticks out in your mind. It was January 3, 2008, and it was 2 Chronicles 15:7, 'Be ye strong therefore, and let not your hands be weak: for your work shall be rewarded.'"
As a side note—this is for all of you parents who have poured your heart and soul into raising a child in a Godly, Bible-believing, praying, Christian home, only to see them seemingly walk away from every single thing you ever taught them. Don't give up on that now-adult child. Don't think they are too far gone. Don't beat yourself up over feeling like you should have done more. You did your best. You prayed with and for them their entire lives, since the moment you knew they were in your womb. Those things you taught them may seem completely cast aside, recanted, and denounced. But the story isn't over. They still live and breathe. You still live and breathe. Don't think for one minute they don't remember all you taught them. Don't think those things don't come back to their minds and send a dart into their inmost soul as they make wrong choices and take paths you warned them against. They haven't forgotten. They feel the sting of guilt. Cling to the promises God gave you in His Word. It never returns to Him void. Even when that child you raised is old, he or she will not depart from what you sacrificed so much to teach them. It will still be there because it is the foundation you poured when they were young. Nothing in this world can pull that out from under them. I am praying for you, dear parent. Keep praying and interceding for them, no matter how hopeless it looks. Do as my dear dying Mom told me to do just a short time before she crossed over. 'Keep pressing on.' Keep the faith. Don't give up. Your work shall be rewarded. I pray God lets you live to see them turn around and come back to the Father's house, in Jesus' name.
"And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not." Galatians 6:9
If I come to mind, will you please pray for me? That God will heal all I am going through. That He will teach me all I need to glean from these intensely fiery trials. That I will hold on to His unchanging hand and be faithful, as Mom and Dad would want me to. Some of you precious friends who know what I have been going through have been praying so hard for me, and you will never know how much you, your faithful prayers, your emails, and other kindnesses mean to me. There are no words to thank you enough. I'm so exhausted and so long for a reprieve and to see His mighty name exalted because HE is the One who wrought the victory. All glory to God for the solid, unmovable, unshakeable foundation of faith my dear parents poured and built in me. It is holding me fast now and keeping my feet firmly planted on the solid Rock, Christ Jesus. To everyone who has or ever will lift my name in prayer, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.
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