The photo above is what used to be my grandparents dining room.  It’s been updated but nevertheless this is the dining room where I ate many meals as a young girl.  In July of 2023 I was struggling to write a Christmas story I’ve had on my heart and I thought perhaps I just needed to buy a fake Christmas tree to use as a writing prop.  What ended up happening is that the Lord had a Christmas tree for sale on Craigslist that was reserved just for me.  I wrote about that here in “God’s Road To Salvation for my Family.’

I was amazed when I looked at the advertisement showcasing a tree that was set up in my grandparents old home.  I recognized the living room by a sign that hangs over the fireplace that says, “For You the Hearth Fire Glows.” I contacted the woman and she kindly gave me a tour of the whole renovated house.  It was a precious gift from God.

The LORD knows where my hurt is.  He knows.  I have been so awestruck that the Lord saw my pain and gave me a Christmas tree from my Grandparents home.  What I had forgotten until recently is that after Grandma Lorraine (my grandmother-in-law) passed away  I did something similar for my mother-in-law.

I had been given a box filled with Christmas ornaments that belonged to Grandma Lorraine.  They had never been used.  From what I remember they were tiny shiny balls of various sizes with wire attached so they could be twisted onto a wreath or a tree.  I got it in my head to decorate a fake Christmas tree with lights and all of these ornaments and set it up in my mother-in-laws yard.  I knew she was hurting because her mother had died and I wanted to ease her pain.  I remember how she went on and on about how much she enjoyed it and that made me happy.

Christmas has never been the same since my mom died.   For years I chased after the Christmas magic.  I anticipated the day filled with family, feasting and gifts.  What I didn’t anticipate was the Christmas war.

For most of my life I was blissfully unaware of the Christmas war.  Looking back to December of 1991 I wish someone had told me the story of Christmas.  By that time I was 18 years old, a new bride and pregnant with my oldest daughter.  My heart was a tattered mess.  I knew I was a sinner but I didn’t understand that God heals broken hearts.

What I didn’t anticipate leading up to my first Christmas as a Mom was my mother-in-law’s furvor. When it came time to celebrate she snatched my precious baby onto her lap and didn’t put her down the whole time.   It was the beginning of what I’ve learned to call the tug of love game.

This year I have added Revelation Wellness.  to my training.  They provide faith based training for your body, mind and spirit.  Their marathon program offers the option to do the marathon virtually as well as in person.  The marathon Revelation Wellness chose for the in person event was the Honolulu Marathon.  In my heart of hearts I wanted to be there but instead I found myself stuck at home and barely able to walk.

On Thanksgiving this year I participated in a 5K Turkey Trot.

Unfortunately after the race my dog pushed my kneecap out of place because she wanted a donut.    I dropped to the ground in the most excruciating pain.  Knee injuries are no joke!

What came as a surprise to me was that the minute my but hit the ground anger poured out of me.  I was looking at my dog and crying out,  “You were supposed to help me!” I wasn’t actually mad at my dog but I realized I was mad at the person I named her after.

Many years ago I was in dire straights in regards to my marriage.  I felt like I was at whits end.  I wanted to save my marriage.  Through a chain of events I came to believe that the Lord had given me a path to follow through a book called “How People Grow,”  by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend.  There was a woman described in the book named Alison and I spent years trying to follow the path that she had taken.

Henry Cloud used to come and speak at Willow Creek Community Church where I was a regular attender for over fourteen years.  Over the course of time I started to look at Henry Cloud as an expert and he truly is.  What I’ve painfully learned is that I had somehow made him into an idol in my heart.

When I got my dog as an eight week old puppy I named her Henrietta Cloud.  I’ll never forget getting into my car with this little white Labrador.  She weighed 12lbs 2oz and I gave her the verse Romans 12:2 which says,  ^“Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.”

As I sat in the drivers seat of my van experiencing puppy kisses I felt the Holy Spirit speak to my heart that Henry Cloud wasn’t God and that he didn’t know everything.  The still small voice I heard in my van that day was the beginning of the LORD showing me how I had looked to a person to do what only God can do.  Only God saves!

In October of 2023 I felt prompted by the LORD to sit down and write a letter to Henry and it was through that process that I realized the error of my ways.  I did my best to explain the circumstances all of which I believed the Lord wanted me to share with him.  I cringe at how many pages it took me to express myself.  Then on October 24, 2023 I sat down and hand wrote a cover letter detailing the contents of a package I had sent Henry.

“Dear Henry,  

Enclosed is a bag of felted hearts my kids and I made.  God’s word says…

He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds. Psalms 147:3… and I believe it!

The Purple Heart cross is special.  I hand crafted it myself and carried it with me while I was writing my book.  My daughter made the wash cloth.

Merry Christmas!  This is my way of saying Thank you for all you do.  I like to give the hearts out regularly but the crosses only come from the refiners fire.  It’s made from purpleheart wood.

Also, enclosed is a card and a rather long letter.  Your book TRUST came out on my 50th Birthday (3/28/2023). It was a God Hug!

I pray for many blessings for you & your family!

Sincerely, Alison M. E. Strutz

You see after the LORD gave me a Christmas tree from my grandparents home I brought it home set it up and decorated it with felted hearts that we make and give away for my ministry.  I like to tell people that God heals broken hearts.  I don’t feel like my heart is fully healed but I don’t think that voids God’s word.  God heals in His way and in His time and I have experienced healing by giving my testimony. It’s a process.

After a time of celebrating with my family I took all of those hearts and mailed them to Henry.  I don’t really have a big following.  I write this blog for my family and whomever God draws.  But I know Henry has a lot of followers and so it seemed good to send them to him.

Something big started back in 2013 when I participated in the Honolulu marathon. I thought I was going with my whole family but instead I found myself boarding a plane alone.  During the pandemic I did a GoFundMe called, “Where There is Love There is L.I.F.E.”  That was a wake up call.

This year my family celebrated Thanksgiving at my mother-in-law and father-in-law’s home.  I didn’t show up.  Instead I was at home processing pain with God.

In December of 2015 my husband lied about where he was working.  He had gotten a new customer and he kept it hidden from me.  I discovered it right after his birthday that year.  He came home from work really excited.  He said God spoke to him and he heard the Lord so clearly and that had never happened to him before.  He had been fasting in an attempt to heal an ulcer.  When he told me the Lord spoke to him I was very excited and asked what He said.

My husband explained that God said he played too much video games and that food is an idol.  As he was explaining this to me I was asking him questions.  We were going back and forth excitedly and as he was explaining and revealing I realized that it didn’t seem like he was talking about being on the job where I thought he was working.  So I questioned him about it.  That’s when he confessed that he had a new customer.  He went on to tell me that at one point he had a thought that, “Alison would not like this.”

The customer was a woman.  I asked her name. I asked what she looked like and I asked why he didn’t tell me.  He told me her name and said she was blonde and fit.  He said he didn’t tell me because he was afraid I wouldn’t want to go to his parents house for Thanksgiving.

Being that there have been many discoveries of women in my marriage I have become fearful of when the next discovery will be.  Whenever my husband is away from my side I wonder if he is looking at porn, visiting a strip club or interacting with a woman that he wants to keep secret from me.

Even though I understand that sex addiction is not about sex, still I struggle with wounds to my own soul.  I wasn’t meant to have to share my husband’s affection.  The impact this has had on me has been like cutting me off at the knees.  I’ve been devastated and it has all but killed any intimacy between us.

Earlier this year my husband came into the kitchen to show me a Netflix show called “KEVIN CAN F…. HIMSELF.”  The main characters are a married couple called Kevin and Alison.  He showed me the trailer and I laughed hysterically for about ten minutes.  Then about a week later I had a day when I was so sick all I could do was lay on my left side and I binge watched the whole two seasons that day.  Not long after a package arrived in the mail.  My husband had bought me a hoodie from the the show.

While I admit this marriage has been very painful, I don’t like what the shirt says.  Season two of the show has an epic ending. It helped me so much!

You see I grabbed onto the book “How People Grow” because there was a girl named Alison in the book and I desperately wanted my marriage to be saved.  But that Alison is not me.  Furthermore I am not the Alison in the Netflix show.  I am a unique person with my own story and God is the author.

I titled this post Ask, Seek, Knock because I want to see the door of salvation opened for people in my family. This is a love paced race.  On December 8th when so many people were actually doing the Honolulu Marathon I was home and unable to walk.  So instead I was working on my writing and my hands were moving at the speed of love.

I downloaded the race bib and put it into the wreath on my office door.   I had hoped to complete a Christmas story that day but instead the Lord had me interceding for a lot of the time. I began praying when I turned on the livestream for the marathon and while I was waiting for it to start a show came on about a woman who was stranded on the side of the highway.  She was picked up by a trucker who pulled a gun on her and told her he was going to rape her.  The show was not what I wanted to be seeing that day but it is exactly what God showed me.

Jesus died for everyone.  The ground is level at the foot of the cross.  He died for rapists and murderers.  He died for the sexually broken.  Jesus heals broken hearts.

There was a woman doing the marathon who learned her ex-husband passed away a few hours before the start of the race.  She said that he loved Jesus but was never able to find freedom from the demons of addiction.  She was heartbroken because she still loved this man in so many ways but at the end of his life she had to love him from a distance for safety reasons.

Darkness grips people but Jesus sets people free!

“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.  Matthew 7:7-8

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.  Romans 6:23