Hi Phil,
This was excellent.  Thanks for posting it.
Give our love to Carol.
Vinny
----- Original Message -----
From: "Phil Scovell" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Saturday, July 30, 2005 1:29 PM
Subject: A Chocolate Testimony


> Carol emailed me this testimony she wrote and asked me to put it on my
> website.  I haven't done so as of yet but am working on formatting it for
my
> site.  For now, I thought echurch people would be encouraged by reading
her
> testimony.  There is way more coming from Carol that you may find
difficult
> to believe.  This story is one that some will have trouble believing but I
> know all the details behind this story and everything you read is true.
> Carol will likely be sharing more as time goes by.  She needs to write an
> auto biography because she could certainly fill a book with all the many
> things the Lord has done, and is continuing to do, in her life.  Some of
you
> old timers to echurch may remember a discussion Carol brought up many
years
> back about her love for chocolate and how concerned she was and didn't
know
> why.  In prayer sessions we had together, the Lord showed her what the
> chocolate was all about.  Even recently, the Lord revealed even more to
her
> as you will see.
>
> THE CONSOLATION PRIZE
>
> By Carol Pearson
>
>
> One day recently I reached for a chocolate bar.  It was  far too
> hot to bother to get anything else to eat and,  anyway, I felt
> pressured by others and a bit down.  . .  ..  Things weren't going
> too well;  that sinking feeling  down into "depression" was
> crowding in on me.  .  As I  reached for the chocolate, I realized
> again how many  times I had done this before.  It had become a
> well-worn  path over more than fifty years of my life!  .  Yes, I
> wanted it somehow to be a consolation to me at that very  moment!
> I knew, Even if I'd done something wrong or just  hadn't quite
> achieved . . . the chocolate WOULD  help me  to feel "Just a bit
> better about myself and my situation!   Again (as I had many times
> before) I reminded the Lord  that I had been concerned about my
> "habit" (to eat this  wonderful tasting "stuff" for a while now
> but I was  powerless to do anything about it.  I told Him again
> that  I wanted Him to reveal any root cause and show me if I
> should leave it alone completely.  Again, I found myself  thinking
> that perhaps I could just cut it down.  . . ..   At that point
> "discipline" came to the fore and I ate  just a third of the bar
> and put the rest away until  another time!
>
> Later that day my mind flashed back to the thoughts I had  had
> when taking the chocolate and then, as if a light had  been turned
> on, I found myself thinking about an occasion  much earlier in my
> life when I was a junior at boarding  school.  I recalled much
> detail of this memory, although  this has not always been the case
> when the Lord has  healed me from past wounds and wrong thinking.
> At that  time we had a visit from a researcher who was most
> interested to learn how blind people "tick", what sort of  things
> we could do, how imaginative we were and whether  we could learn a
> complicated little route.  His tests  were quite numerous and
> varied and I quite enjoyed them.   We listened to a series of
> noises and had to tell a story  around them, adding to the story
> as each noise was given  to us.  We had a maize through which we
> had to walk and  most of us got horribly lost.  We had yet another
> test  which involved working out exactly where a sound came  from.
> There were others also, but I don't remember them   now.  I do
> however remember that after each test we were  rewarded with small
> bars of chocolate.  It seemed to me  that some friends got more
> than others, and perhaps this  was because they were better at the
> tests but it may have  been because they were "the favourites",
> and of course I  didn't like that very much . . ..  However, we
> all got  some chocolate each time a test was given and that was
> the best part of taking the tests and made it all  worthwhile!
> Truly, when we had done badly, the chocolate  was a consolation!
>
> As I had seen that flashback to that memory so clearly, I  then
> saw His truth as He revealed it to me!  "That's  right, Lord," I
> said:  "The chocolate was 'my  consolation' - it was given to me
> whether I did well or  badly.  I reflected, "It was given at other
> times in my  childhood also.  It was the way to say "Thank you
> very  much, little girl, for your services" as, on a number of
> occasions, I was forced to please relations and friends  of the
> family as they allowed their sexual desires to  have full pleasure
> as they did what they wished with a  small, frightened child.  The
> chocolate bars were the  presents for "being a good little girl
> and saying nothing  to anyone about these terrifying experiences!"
> Again,  the bars of chocolate were given as a consolation from
> Daddy when there was nothing else he could give to me  when he had
> been away working and I had not been able to  understand where he
> was and why he had left me!  Yes,  they were my "consolations" and
> "my comforts" and I  enjoyed them!
>
> I understood a long time ago that people often took  comfort in
> their eating and even knew that I did it  myself, but now, as He
> spoke into my situation and  thinking, this became personal to me.
> I was able to  understand where this root had its beginnings and
> to face  the lies which emerged every time I ate the chocolate!  I
> knew how Dad had felt so much better when he gave me the
> chocolate on his return from another work trip, but the  gift he
> bore each time soon became a "must" for his  little girl who
> needed the comfort she thought it  afforded!  The chocolate had
> also served to help those  who took me to their beds to feel
> better about what they  had done to me and be reasonably sure that
> I would keep  quiet.  I had to face it though, that it only
> satisfied  for a little while, then I needed some more to be "my
> fix" for depression, loneliness, bereavement,  disappointments and
> so many other problems in my life.  I  needed that chocolate time
> and again!  What a ghastly  state.  I knew without a doubt that I
> was certainly no  better than those who abuse their bodies with
> drugs and  alcohol and all I could do was to cry out to the Lord
> for  His victory for me!
>
> I acknowledged before my Heavenly Father that I had  substituted
> all that He had to give to me and all that He  would do for me
> with "my temporary fix" of chocolate.   For years, I had said time
> and again that I wanted to  know the riches of God and His
> abundance in my life, but  over and over again I had chosen my own
> comfort!  I knew  I had treated my Heavenly Father very badly in
> taking the  chocolate instead of asking for His mercy and great
> riches.  I poured out my heart to Him and asked His  forgiveness.
> Then I waited quietly to see what He would  say to me.  I knew He
> would speak because otherwise I  would be left with a problem far
> too big for me to  address!  I knew well enough that He would not
> leave me  comfortless but He would come to me!  (See John 14:18.)
>  He had spoken those words to me, as He did to His  disciples, on
> a number of occasions during my walk with  Him, so they were very
> precious!
>
> He showed me a picture.  A tiny baby lay in His arms.   (Yes, that
> baby was me.)  There was a large comfort  blanket tucked under my
> chin.  I had been sucking it,  because it was my comforter.  As I
> fell asleep, He gently  removed it.  Then, something else
> happened.  He spread me  out in front of Him and began to breathe
> into my  nostrils.  I was receiving the very life of God Himself!
>  I could no longer use that blanket to meet my needs  because now
> they were being met by the very breath of God  as He continued to
> fill me!  I had nothing to do except  just to lie there and take
> in the pure sustaining Spirit  of God!
>
> Now that He has spoken clearly to me and answered my  prayers, I
> know my need can no more be met with a bar of  chocolate!  When I
> find, for any reason, that I am not  coping with pain and grief,
> fear and frustration, or  anything at all that separates me from
> Jesus Christ  and causes me to move from my place of rest, I have
> to go  directly to the One Who Satisfies.  Taking the chocolate
> first and then going to My Father in Heaven is no longer  an
> option for me.  He requires that I go straight to Him  and find He
> has more than enough to supply all my need!   I have thanked Him
> that, by His grace alone, He will work  this in me to His glory!
>
> It has been very important here that God has come to me  in answer
> to my prayers and spoken with me about this  problem  I had in my
> life.  Hearing from others about the  hold of a habit in a life
> and even agreeing with them is  not enough!  We have to invite the
> King of Kings and Lord  of Lords to come in and take His rightful
> place.  He is  gracious and heals and restores.  He does not
> condemn us  for our weakness.  He understands it and makes us
> strong   as He deals with everything that we have placed before
> Him in our lives.  There are some who believe that they  do live
> completely without sin in their lives now that  they are
> Christians.  Well, I long for that day to be  true in my life, but
> I choose right now to acknowledge  the truth and confess God's
> Word, as the Apostle John  wrote in his first letter:
>
> 8  If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,  and the
> truth is not in us. 9  If we confess our sins, he  is faithful and
> just to forgive us [our] sins, and to  cleanse us from all
> unrighteousness. 10  If we say that  we have not sinned, we make
> him a liar, and his word is  not in us. (1 John 1:8-10 AV)
>
> One day I will know the joy of the power of Jesus living  always
> and forever in my life.  Meantime, I do still  reach for that
> chocolate occasionally, but now have a far  greater understanding
> of what I'm doing (yes, committing  sin) if I take it to pacify
> some need in my life which  God wants to meet!  Then I have to
> confess it, get up  again and go on giving all to Him and asking
> Him to show  His power in me!
>
> I don't know what things you find yourself reaching for  when the
> going gets tough, but He knows and, if you will  only ask Him, He
> will work a miracle in your life that  will free you from any
> bondage however long you have been  bound by it!  We cannot free
> ourselves but we can want  Him to free us!  He is our God and He
> has the right to  say to us, "You shall have no other god but Me"!
>  That simply means having nothing to depend upon (trust or  rely
> upon) or give our affections to that takes His  rightful place!
>
> We can be in bondage to many things or people.  We have  wrong
> relationships where we seek to serve another  person, (sometimes
> allowing our flesh to be gratified.   We go on doing what pleases
> others and not what pleases  God!  We get into such messes and
> cannot help ourselves  out of them.  Praise God!  He waits to be
> gracious to us  and to free us from everything that does not
> glorify Him!
>
> God doesn't give Himself as "a consolation".  He gave   Himself
> fully when He sent His son to die on a cross for  each one of us,
> taking with Him all the sin of a fallen,  depraved world!  He
> doesn't offer a consolation prize  for being good because none of
> us are good in His eyes,  but He does offer us His grace in
> abundance which brings  us from darkness into His wonderful light
> and sets us on  course to gain that prize of eternal life with Him
> which  He has for every one of us if we will live according to
> His rules!  Put very simply, we win only as we put Him  first in
> all things and love Him with all our mind and  soul and strength
> and that means putting nothing before  Him and allowing Him daily
> to satisfy all the longings of  our grieving, hurting, wounded,
> sin-sick souls.  Will you  go there with me and offer up to Him
> whatever it is that  you reach for to satisfy every pain that you
> bear today?   If you will do this, He will give to you much, much
> more  than you could ever dare to imagine.
>
> If you want to do this but need help to share your pain  and
> suffering with Him, Safe Place Fellowship offers you  help and
> security as you find your way through whatever  troubles you to
> that place of wholeness in God as we find  His provision to be
> sufficient for all our needs!
>
>
> --
> Copyright:  Carol Pearson - July 2005.
>
> Safe Place Fellowship
> Phil Scovell
> Denver, Colorado USA
> Phone:  303-507-5175
> WWW.SafePlaceFellowship.com