Kristi Muszik What Fifty years look like for me.
As I lay in bed this morning, I pondered what fifty years of my life have looked like—a life of resilient, persistent, and relentless love.
A friend of mine sent me a song called, “She is a Warrior.” She said that’s what I am and I cried, as it blessed my heart.
I went through a traumatic birth experience, an intense story itself, and wasn’t sure if I was going to live. If I did live, I was expected to have brain damage from the trauma.
Endured hearing and speech disabilities -hearing loss of more than 80%, the Dr wanted to send me to an institution—poor eyesight with a lazy eye. I received healing when I was four, when my family’s spiritual father and mentor, Dave Roberson, prayed for me—then spent years battling to keep the manifestation and endured hearing aids, glasses, and speech therapy. I can read lips somewhat.
I spent the first seven years of my life screaming in terror almost every night due to the tournament of the demonic realm—details to share at another time.
I felt and knew I was different from the other kids growing up. My dad did all he could to try and make a normal life for me, instructing family, friends, and teachers not to treat me differently than the other kids, and making sure they looked at me to allow me to read their lips.
I grew up as a pastor kid. Experience the beauty, blessing, reward, and pain of it all, including a heartbroken church split. I have sat at the feet and quiet personal time with generals of faith. I have served the church for forty years. I started handling the word projector during church worship at eight years of age. I have served, from scrubbing toilets to overseeing the pastoral care team under the lead pastor and everything in between. I have endured a heart wrench church split. I have sat hours upon hours under the teachings of the words and prophetic and leadership training. I have witnessed healing in others as I prayed for them. Confirmation that the prophetic words or words of knowledge given to others were on point.
My grandparents were missionaries and I had the honor to travel to Philippines, Hong Kong, China, and South Korea. I smuggled bibles into China. I am the third generation of my family – grandparents, father, and now me to preached in the first foursquare church started outside of the USA in Iloilo, Philippines.
I am the oldest of five children, with an age difference of four and a half, seven, fourteen, and two months shy of twenty years. My mom was over seven months pregnant at my first wedding. I wasn’t the best oldest sister. I lived my own life and wasn’t much involved with them until later. We talked of beautiful memories when we were all together. I have welcomed some siblings in love and nieces and nephews.
I faced death four times and different types of abuse. Ten different car accidents – one was so traumatic I almost never drove again.
I have been married two times. Divorce once.
The first one, the Lord directed me not to marry, but through disobedience, I experienced seventeen years of pain that is covered by forgiveness and love and some memorable moments to keep in memory and close to my heart. I have in-laws’ siblings who have carried through after the divorce; we still hold each other as brothers and sisters for thirty years, and they have adopted Joe, my current husband, as their brother, too.
The second marriage will be celebrating ten years of blissfulness next month. Yes, blissful. We had a couple of misunderstandings in the beginning and some adjustments in the flesh this past year, as we are now living twenty-four-seven with each other. But we have never fought and are living a life of love and peace. I have gained another set of wonderful in-law siblings: a stepdaughter, a son-in-law, and a grandson and granddaughter.
I love being a mom and now a Grammy. I am not a perfect mother, but I am learning and keeping a teachable heart. The beautiful treasures of my heart are my son, daughter in love, and granddaughter, who live in Oregon—a daughter and son in love who live in Washington. I have experienced the tore of my heart with the dislike of living in a different state than my children, as I love and want to stay close to them. I have reaped the blessings of surrendering my children to the Lord and hours of praying over them that have saved their lives.
The Lord brought a divine, beautiful connection into my life, my beloved spirit sister. The Lord has also brought other beautiful souls into my life, and dear family and friends who have moved to heaven.
I have had to adjust to my mom moving to heaven, letting go of her ability to speak into my life when I needed someone. I also welcome my sweet bonus mom, a blessing in my dad’s life, who loves us kids, grandkids, and great-grandkids.
I lived nineteen years in Oregon, twenty-seven years in Washington state, and three years in Texas -I still have a Texas driver’s license as we are keeping it as our home state. I spent one year in a fifth wheel, currently parked in Oregon and soon to be taken off to the East Coast.
I had my first job as a weekly babysitter at twelve. I started working at a daycare as a janitor when I was fourteen until I turned sixteen – a legal age to work with the kids. I worked as a banquet department server at a hotel, serving anywhere from the working class to the governor. I was a full-time homemaker, raising my heart treasures and homeschooling them. I had my in-home daycare license and my own cleaning business. I worked as a caregiver for the mature generation, working closely with the hospice nurses and helping them with the transition stage of the clients going into their eternity living. I worked for the school district transportation as a monitor on the school bus. I worked at a pregnancy center to help encourage unexpected parents and see the safety of precious babies’ lives.
I have gained a lot of weight. It’s not weight due to having babies; I lost all that weight within the first month of delivery, weighing 120 pounds. The weight is caused by stress, anxiety, wrong cravings, and disobedience to the Lord by not taking care of my body.
I lived a life in tremendous fear to the point that it opened up to a significant mother of all panic attacks. I allowed all different types of fear. Fear for my life and my children’s life. What others thought of me. Finances, heights, claustrophobia, and the demonic spirit realm.
There was a time when I despised myself, disliked myself, and didn’t think I had anything to offer others. I didn’t know I had the right to live and let my voice be heard. I battled with suicidal thoughts.
I lived many years of being so focused on the task before me and not the people around me. I am learning to slow down and make memories of the heart. I have lived a selfish life of pride—not wanting to surrender to the Lord fully. There have been moments of surrendering fully to the Lord, doing what my flesh doesn’t like, and reaping the reward of giving it all to the Lord. I see in myself more that I need to surrender unto the Lord fully, and I am making a point of the next fifty years to be more fully surrendering, giving God all the Glory.
I don’t know what the next fifty years are going to look like, but God does, as he wrote my book before my existence. I choose to surrender myself fully to Him the next fifty years to live out His heart of purpose for my life. A blessing rewarding life.
