Transcription

John McDougall:  …Hi. I’m John McDougall and I’m here today with Rosemary Fisher. She’s the author of “Recycled Women.” Rosemary, tell us a little bit about your background and conversion story.

Rosemary Fisher:  Absolutely, and thank you, John, so much for inviting me on this podcast. Many, many years ago, I was brought up in church. I was raised going to church actually three times a week. On Sunday for two hours, Tuesday for one hour, Thursday for two hours.

I was brought up in a very legalistic environment which means a lot of rules, a lot of regulations. It was all about pleasing God, because if you didn’t please God, you were in a lot of trouble. I was raised not only in a legalistic atmosphere, but it also caused a lot of emotional fear because I knew God more as being a judge than I did as a loving Father.

Then to add on top of that, my environment was my father was also a working alcoholic. He overworked and he drank a lot. He was very, extremely angry.

I don’t know the whole story of how him and my mother came together. I know they were from two separate religions. We brought that into the family dynamic as well. People believing two different things from two different religious backgrounds, and I was stuck right there in the middle.

I received a lot of verbal abuse. I saw a lot of physical abuse between my mother and father. Then we would go to church and my mother would have black eyes. There was a lot of judging and a lot of finger pointing.

Seeing people embrace her because I loved her with all of my heart, I saw her as being the weak one in our family, which all it did was fuel me up to want to try to protect her when really parents are supposed to be protecting their children.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love my parents. I lost my father when I was eight years old to an alcoholic accident on his birthday. He died. The family was pretty much relieved just due to the fact that we didn’t have to worry about beatings anymore, and so on, and so forth.

Continued to go to church, but I never saw any love. I never saw really, truly what I believed is the hands and feet of love in Jesus Christ. I also never saw any transformation taking place in church environments.

You read the Bible, you hear these amazing stories. You’re supposed to live one way and you come home or go visit family and friends of the same denomination or religion, and you see no transformation.

About the age of 14, I started meeting people outside of church. I started going to school and realizing that the people that were living real were the people that I wasn’t supposed to hang out with, but at least they were real.

They weren’t living a double life, is what I would say, of saying one thing and then walking out the church doors and doing another. There’s a real popular song on at the time by Van Halen, called “Running with the Devil.”

I just thought to myself, these people are at least real. I had a lot of church hurts and church ruins to add on to my rebellion that began at that time so I just decided I’d rather hang out with the people that partied, drank, cussed, and everything else.

At lease if they didn’t like you, they would tell you [laughs] they didn’t like you. Instead of someone smiling at you and then talking badly about you behind your back.

Long story short, I just hit the streets. I left church. I let everyone know I’d rather hang out with the sinners than be more or less of a pharecy. I ran and I ran.

My mother committed suicide when I was 16. I blamed God. I blamed the religious people. I really, truly was bitter and angry. It just fueled my alcoholism, my drug habits, and everything else to give me justification of becoming everything that I never wanted to become, more like my father.

It wasn’t until the age of 30, with a lot of train wrecks behind me that I finally hit the floor in my apartment building and just cried out to God and said, “Look, if you are really, really there, then I need you to show up right now because I cannot do it any longer.”

At that point, what happened was this sense of peace, this embrace that I can’t even possibly put into words, just fell upon me. As I wept, I probably wept for three days.

John:  Wow.

Rosemary:  Friends and family came over…

John:  Amazing.

Rosemary:  Yes. Co‑workers that I would call family were concerned about me and I’m crying going, “No, it’s good. It’s good.” Basically, what I believe is, I was just being purged. With all the stuff I played with, all the things I did, I just really believe at that point, my conversion took place of receiving God’s Holy Spirit.

From that point forward, my life began to transform. When I say transform, it’s all of a sudden, the things that used to be so attractive to me, going to the bar, hanging out, having promiscuous relationships, and it just no longer felt right.

I knew it was wrong and I wanted to live differently, not self‑righteously, but to live as a new creation that the Bible talks about in 2nd Corinthians 5:17. “When the old is gone, it’s gone. You have become a new creation.”

The inside was brand new. My circumstances did not change. However, because I was changing, things started to change because of my choices. That’s one of the reasons why I wrote the book.

It was to show people that when it really, really happens, when you finally realize that you give up and you call on the Almighty God to take over and be your Lord and Savior. He’s such a gentleman. He’s like, “OK. It’s about time. Let me help you live a successful life.”

Now he called me back into the church, which has been a blessing. When he first called me to the church, I was like, “Uh, could you send me to Africa?”

[laughter]

Rosemary:  Really what he wanted me to do was number one, to heal. Number two, forgive. To be different, to make sure that I can be that person when someone is hurting in the pews, that’s afraid, or that’s been mistreated.

I can be his hands and feet and wrap my arms around them. Take the journey with them and be respectful of where they’re at. Help them to where they need to go in pointing to Jesus instead of pointing to rules and regulations.

John:  Wow. That’s an incredible background. You have a lot of support now with people in your life that are on that right path and trying to stay on that?

Rosemary:  Yes, I have. What I have found through my teaching, and through my writing, and speaking engagements, is that there is such a deep desire within the church of all these broken hearts sitting in the pews, that just want real. They just want real.

I find that the more transparent we are, we’re sharing where we were, or what we’re struggling with. The Holy Spirit and God will just place people around you that will edify you, that will help you along and will also stand in God’s word.

I was one of those. I laid the Bible down. I just said to God, “You know what Lord, I know there is some stuff in here I don’t understand. I know your word says that your ways are higher than my ways. I’m not going to understand everything but I’m just going to trust you. I’m just going to do what you say to do and I’m just going to trust you that it’s going to work out.”

John, to this day, every time I do everything that’s opposite of what the world says to do, than what’s popular, I get so blessed. Not only am I blessed by it, but I’m also able to have that solidity in saying this really works.

John:  Wow. That’s great. Sounds like you have a great sense of peace and you’re inspired with your ministry, and things you’re doing. What are some things you do to keep up beat and inspired whether it’s books or people you’re around?

Rosemary:  That’s a great question. I think the first thing that I always have to remember, number one, is that God is bigger than me and I need to just really trust him to really let go and do what I need to do to live a good life. Stay in his word. His word is alive.

I tell the people that I speak and teach to, which is a great inspiration to me, is to always talk, share, and listen to people. Find out what their struggle is. I dangled in new age religion.

I tried everything before I got on my faith, worshiping myself basically as I am my own God or whatever. I can relate to a lot of different people where they’re at spiritually.

Not saying that they’re wrong in what they believe, but for me to give my own personal testimony because I’ve experienced it for them to consider it as, “Wow, I never thought of it that way.”

My inspiration is definitely to help others. My inspiration is to stay in the word of God because there will be things I read two years ago, and all of sudden I re‑read it and it’s as if he just put it in there just for me.

My other inspiration is my son. My husband and I both lived wild child, rebellious lives. We became followers of Jesus Christ, late in our life, in our thirties.

He’s 16 now and we purposely made choices to reverse the curse that both of our families were deep into. This kid gets to see a couple parents that really truly love each other, love the Lord, love him, and although we make mistakes, we know how to say we’re sorry.

We repent. We try to learn from it together. He’s my inspiration to really let him see what real is out of being a believer in Jesus Christ. Not a bunch of rules and regulations and then live with a double life. It’s really important for us to live real 24/7.

John:  That’s great. Sounds like a real nice family. I think your son is in a good place. That’s a great story that you have your husband as well that was similar to you and you guys can relate to each other, and keep each other on track. That sounds good.

Rosemary:  I just want to thank you so much. John, feel free to visit my website. It’s Rosemaryfisher.com and I’d love to send you any video files or anything that you need.

If anybody has any questions, they can feel free to email me. I would love to share whatever I can on my own personal experience and testimony to let people know they have value. They were created for a purpose and a reason, and that God loves them and wants to see them win.

John:  That’s amazing and very generous to offer for people to reach out. Your website again is Rosemaryfisher.com?

Rosemary:  Yes, that’s correct. It’s Rosemary and then Fisher. F‑I‑S‑H‑E‑R.com.

John:  OK, that’s great. We’ll check it out and thanks for talking to us today.

Rosemary:  Thank you. God bless you, John.

John:  Yeah. Peace. Talk to you soon…