MySTORY> pt1

This is a draft of MySTORY pt 1 written by the one and only Leuuuuuugh Friedriches. I did some editing on it last night and will be publishing it as part of the StoryforHisGLORY project that is under development! I can’t escape the idea of telling people’s stories. I am currently working with several other people to put together a “project” that will be two fold. The first will be “HopeSTORIES” which will consist of stories from every kind of dimension that display the Lord’s work in a person’s life. The second part is the “StoryPROJECTS” which will focus on telling people’s stories in order to raise the awareness of their situation and allow everyday people the chance to “change someone’s story” by buying a beautiful custom tee based around their story.

So here it is… Part 1 of course cause unfortunately my story is one with MANY dimensions.

She’s one of those people that you do not meet twice. She is all of those nice things you hear people say and a hundred more. You can’t really put your finger on it but you know it has something to do with her love for life. I met Natalie Ashy Spera a couple years ago. Just a few years over 20 you could never tell the story that she contains.

Born and raised in Baton Rouge, La Natalie is far from your typical Southern girl. When you talk to her it is hard to imagine the pain that she speaks of as being her own. When she described herself as a kid she mentioned something along the lines of “a rebel without a cause”. Being raised by great parents and brought up with all a girl could have asked for.  She still had a hard time fitting into the mold of her other peers. There is a quote I read the other day that said, “The cure for boredom is curiosity and there is no cure for curiosity.” But Natalie would soon find that out. She started finding things on her own that could bring more excitement to her life. After switching to public school for getting asked to leave the private one she got mixed up with the “bad crowd”. Her life took on new twists and turns. At the pinnacle of this time she ended up with friends in Memphis TN one night for a concert. After they drove through the night with alcohol and drugs as their guides she ended up in the same hospital that Elvis died in, only she was hanging on for dear life.

Typically a child this age would have immediately been scheduled meeting with her parents but instead the situation was thrown on the back burner when she got back home because upon her arrival back she found out her dad was given 6 months to live because he was diagnosed with brain cancer. It was a short 5 months later that her mother found out that she had a tumor on her brain as well and would need immediate surgery for it’s removal.

Within a couple of weeks Natalie’s life was turned inside out and upside down. The life she once relied on had failed her and almost took her life. Her parents current state left her lost and with a lot of questions. It wasn’t too long before a friend of her sister’s started reaching out to her with the message of Jesus. Natalie was immediately gripped. She knew there was more to life than what she had been living and she was desperate for the remedy.

Her mom had surgery to remove the tumor, but died 9 months after because of complications. Just three months after dealing with the passing of her mother, her father passed on as well after battling cancer for almost two years. At 22 yrs. old Natalie was left an orphan. Picking up pieces of her brokenness life never looked the same again for her. With no other family support, no parents and a life the world offered left behind she hoped that this Jesus man had more to offer. She began to piece her heart back together slowly through new godly friends, the local church Healing Place, which a friend had brought her to and the assurance that, “beauty would come from the ashes”.

Her relationship with Christ began to bloom and she continued to pursue this life altering relationship with God. She leaned in hard on the One she gave her life to and she opened up her wounded heart to the people that He began to surround her with. Psalm in 68:6 says, “He is a Father to the fatherless and He places the lonely people in families”. It was this verse that she held onto through all those days and you can truly see now that Jesus does indeed give a crown of beauty for ashes.

Her story is one of HOPE. It’s one that exemplifies JOY and PEACE in the aftermath of heartache and pain. God has truly redeemed all that was lost by bringing her into a new family, the church family that has been instrumental in her healing in becoming the woman God created her to be.

Natalie declares today that without Christ nothing is possible, but with Him all things are. He makes all things beautiful. Even the most ugly.