My High Tower

Today is my daughter's birthday which seems a fitting day to begin my blogging journey. As usual on birthdays, I long to reminisce, but if I look back I want to do it with the hope of learning something - something that I can, perhaps, pass along.

I don't know if I have anything useful to say, I only know I need to say it. I hope to write about love and marriage and love without marriage and marriage without love. And children. And grandchildren. And so I begin.

I wasn't a Christian when Sarah was born. And when I got a part-time job and put her in nursery school my only complaint about the school was that it was a Christian school. And Sarah would come home singing, "Jesus loves me this I know..." I found it extremely annoying.

My testimony probably begins there in the shadow of that nursery school, but I'll save that story for another day. On this day, I want to fast forward to real time, to the present with all its joy and sorrow.

I begin this journey from a painful place not because I want to be here, but because this is where I am. This is where the Lord has put me. Like the Israelites I am wandering about the desert and though not for 40 years certainly for a lot longer than I'd planned. And I'm wondering if like Moses I'm supposed to hit a rock to find water or simply speak to it.

In a search for Moses and the rock, we read at aish.com 

"God's response: "Since you HIT the rock rather than speaking to it, you will not lead the Jewish people into the Land of Israel" (Numbers 20:11-12).

We read this story and think: Here's the mighty Moses, who confronted Pharaoh, arranged the Ten Plagues, split the Red Sea, brought the Torah down from Mount Sinai, and defended the people through trials and tribulations in the desert. Now he makes one little mistake and God takes away his dream of entering Israel. The consequence seems inappropriately harsh!"

Do your circumstances seem particularly harsh?

"He alone is my rock and my salvation; he is my fortress, I will never be shaken." Psalm 62:2 NIV I think I've almost always known of this verse. God is my rock. I like that. It's so solid. Rock. I like to think about God as my rock even though, unlike the author of this Psalm, I have been shaken. I mean, seriously, I live in Southern California. All kidding aside, I confess that my faith has been shaken - many times. And, by the grace of God, He has seen me through those shaky times. He can see you through those tough times, too, those times when your knees are wobbly.

I'm drawn to another verse as well, although I don't remember when I first read this one: "My goodness, and my fortress; my high tower, and my deliverer; my shield, and he in whom I trust; who subdueth my people under me." Psalm 144:2 KJV although I do remember being taken aback. Wow. God is my high tower. He is Sharon Hightower's high tower. Amazing. He is your fortress as well.

Charles Aaron "Bubba" Smith was found dead in LA yesterday. An NFL player, he gained perhaps even more recognition in his role as the super strong Moses Hightower of the "Police Academy" series of movies. And it was just this week that someone asked me - again - if I were related to him. I'm often asked. Because I'm white, people think it's a funny question, but I think people just remember this name, so they ask.

Long before "ancestry.com," I wondered about the origins of my first husband's last name, but I never really did any research. Lots of folks in my husband's family used to tell me it came from the Cherokee line, but I don't think there were a lot of high towers around back then. High mountains, yes. High towers, maybe not. The family also may be German and some say there's Russian mixed in, but the name turns out to be British - a bit boring, but true. And some branch of the family found their way to the South. I’ve seen two tombstones reading John Hightower – one on each side of the Mason-Dixon line. Apparently they fought for the Blue and the Gray.

Interestingly, my second husband's last name is Torres which, as you may have guessed, means tower. Coincidence? I hadn't thought about it when I was thinking about remarrying, and I no longer recall who first translated it for me, but there it is. I have twice married Towers.

I have memorized very few verses of Scripture in my time, but I would like to encourage you to do what I have failed to do. In fact, much of this post will probably be about just that. We're told we can't learn from another's mistakes, but perhaps we can. It would certainly be a lot less painful then having to make all of our own mistakes, wouldn't it?

I hope to use Titus 2:4 KJV as my authority, if you will, to talk with you. "That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children."

The "they" in that verse are "older women." And I am an older woman. I am 63, mother of two  and grandmother of nine! In the 70s when birth control became so much easier, we took advantage. Not so, many younger woman today. But, here again, God must know what he is doing. I was third in a family of seven, so if there was any one thing I was clear about when I first got married, it was that I didn't want a large family. And I struggled - really struggled - with two.

In some small way, I'd like to share my struggles with you. I hope to encourage you, to hold you up, maybe even to teach you. 

Teach a mother to love her children. What an odd thought, yet the news media have been crazy these days in their following of a mother whom they believe did not love her child while headlines grudgingly admit there must have been a reasonable doubt: "Casey Anthony trial acquittal: Death of Caylee Anthony is still a mystery." Christian Science Monitor – Tue, Jul 5, 2011

What kind of a monster kills her own child? We recoil at the thought. 

When I told my first husband to leave, I thought my children were old enough! They were 14 and 17. WHAT was I thinking? Children are never old enough! Everyone said, you can't stay married just for the kids. Yes, you can. And, yes, you should. There is life after your children are grown. And you can wait. 

Why? Why should you wait? If you split your family into pieces, something inside of your children will die. Something inside of your child will be torn asunder. The consequences of divorce are extremely harsh.