Dear Daniel,

Hi, my name is Bonita. I don’t know if you remember me. I was just one of the many who came through your Home hoping to rejoin the Family. I was 12 then. I’m 22 now and here’s a little background.

I grew up more or less FM (TS at the time). In most of my formative years all I knew of the Family was the Word that my Mom read with all of us each morning. We didn’t have much contact with the rest of the Family due to misunderstandings that left my personal family rather ostracized (I needn’t get into details).

Dare I say partly because of this lack of Family fellowship, and partly because people make their own decisions, one by one my older siblings started going to high school, getting jobs, making friends, boyfriends & girlfriends. It was plain to see (though not easy to accept) the effect all these things had on my brother & sisters. Within a short amount of time they were introduced to drugs, drinking, smoking, occult books and premarital, well, I won’t get into details. Stress, arguments, sadness and fear are the four words I would use to describe many memories of that time.

I was three days away from turning 12 when I first met you. Some letter had gone out to all the Family asking you “DO” members to make contact with those of us who were TS or former members. A bunch of you came, young and old, to host three day meetings in the city I grew up. I was amazed and dumbfounded. The first thing I remember was happiness, smiles and joy emanating from all of you. The second thing I noticed, and this is what stayed in my mind, was that you all belonged. I wanted to belong too. I made the decision the day before my 12th birthday that I wanted to rejoin the Family.

Half a year later I spent a week in your Home. I was of course too young to rejoin, but you all still let me “come and see”, and I was sold on it. The next couple of years I worked hard to finish schooling. Mom home-schooled me through most of my high school years and helped me to finish up four years of high school in only three. The last semester I transferred to a semi-secular school to get all the credits I needed. I graduated valedictorian of my class, with a 4.0 GPA (a.k.a. straight A’s all through high school. That says something for Family schooling, don’t you think?)

A month after finishing high school, I asked the closest Family Home if I could join them. They said yes, and I rejoined at 14 years old. I remember thinking before rejoining if only I could be in the Family, I would never have another “trial”. That was naïve. I’m sure you remember the song that starts “When you joined the Lord’s army…”.

At 15 the Lord called me to India. Most of the members of the Home decided to go, and we made it there when I was 16: a whole group of my Family friends. I was stoked. Within six months all my closest friends left India and my best friend died. It was then I learned a valuable lesson that has kept me in the Family serving the Lord. I can’t be here for anything but Him. I wrote the following poem around that time:

The Rain
The gray clouds gather in the sky above;

The blue sky sets the stage.
The onward fight for truth and love
Carries on into this age.

The rain falls fast and swift and fierce.
The plants a-waiting grow;
But grow in love, their hearts do pierce,
Or hate, we do not know.

Let us then go forth as rain,
To counteract evil from the sky.
Refresh against evil and its pain;
We know not where we fall, but why.

To bring to life the dying plants,
Across the world our seeds to sow,
To bring a hope and helping hands
Upon the wanton Earth below

Cry for me, I am the tear
That falleth from the weeping sky.
The Mother Earth, she waits the year
For perhaps another hopeful try.

But we are now and we will win,
Through trials, tests and pain.
The Kingdom of God we’ll usher in,
For THEY CAN’T STOP OUR RAIN!

Though still in India, I’ve visited my family a few times. My brothers’ and sisters’ lives have settled down from the rather turbulent years I remember before moving away from home. They’re all doing real well. I’m very happy about that and still consider myself quite close to each one of them. I love them very much although none are in “The Family”, and respect them for making the best of their lives.

One time I went to visit I considered staying. I was getting kind of tired of the “life of sacrifice”. It took a few months for me to decide what I wanted to do and those few months were not easy for me or for those I lived with. Out of the blue a friend wrote me and also sent me a prophecy (no coercion therein). Amazingly, the prophecy entailed exactly what I was going through, in its own way, and said the decision was up to me. I thought and I prayed, I walked and I cried and then I made my decisions. Live for myself, or live for others? That was really what it boiled down to. How could I face looking over my life once it was over and say, “Yeah, I lived for me. I got a job to support myself, feed myself and make myself happy.” Maybe that kind of life is fine for others, but it’s not for me. About that time I wrote this:

THE CHOICE IS YOURS
Follow fate or make a path
I know not what to do
Evoke the season’s passing wrath
Or stand with chosen few
I see the ones who choose to stand
Albeit their numbers wane
I see them walking hand in hand—
Forever Satan’s bane.
Shall I walk with a fool’s tread?
Follow a road I know brings pain?
Shall I try to beg for bread,
When with kings my fare has lain?
Will I seek for mystique truths
When the answer is at hand?
Will I forsake searching youth,
Thus forsaking Heaven’s land?—
Or choose the path I know holds true,
Wherever it may lead;
Follow the sacred, chosen few,
Obey the Saints’ strong creed.
Seek the ones beside in pain,
Bring them to the light?
Behold, that is my life’s refrain.
I won’t give up the fight!
Though the path I make alone, it seems,
Yet it is not.
For when the truth of life be shown,
Here are endless ones who fought.
Their names now placed in Book of Life,
The Saints who chose to cry,
“Through weariness of this sad life
We will fight and die!”

I’ll join them, tears of joy will fall
That I be counted with such,
Who chose to give their life, their all,
To lend Earth Heaven’s touch.
Henceforth I will not back down,
As sands are racing through time’s spell.
I’ll reach toward the glowing crown,
And someday the Book of Life will tell.
And we will know the honored ones,
And we shall see eternal joys,
Passed to those who chose to shun
The fleeting pleasures, passing toys.
I hope to be counted as with them,
Who willingly kept up the fight,
Who chose the creed of wiser men,
And sought to shine, though all was night.
We shall be together soon,
As through the hall we all shall pass.
I will see you over the moon,
When forever comes to greet us at last.
Until then let us hold our swords,
And fight each day like it’s our last.
Let’s remember the word of the Lord’s
“Behold My coming will be fast.”
Faster yet, the time it goes,
Let us not tarry, but make haste,
To gather the harvest, before our foes
Bring the crop to wanton waste.
We know His coming will be soon,
As dawn shall surpass darkest night.
As sun outshines the brightest moon,
He will honor us with His light.

So I decided to stay in the Family. Within 2 years I married a wonderful guy, found what I would consider a dream vocation (yes, in the Family). Obviously a certain someone who dwells in the netherworld didn’t want me to find my calling and tried real hard to steal it away, but thanks to the prayers of others and the love of Jesus, I made it. My husband and I now have a five month old daughter, who daily lights up our lives and gives us another reason to be in the Family. There is no place I would rather her grow up than in the Family. I know, because I’ve seen the other side, there is no place she will have such purpose and meaning for living, such belonging and love, and such joy in helping others.

As far as the recent shocking and eye opening events, anything I say would only echo the words of many others who have already written their opinions and views in this forum of “my conclusion”. But I would like to say that once you pass a certain age, you become accountable for your own decisions. Almost 30 years of age is a bit too old to be blaming someone else for your upbringing and resultant choices in life. Were Eric and Dylan folks put behind bars because of the Columbine massacre? Perhaps we should have put every middle class American parent on trial and threatened to take away their kids in case they become the next Dylan or Eric. What do you think? And they were about half the age of Ricky, who definitely had entered his personal age of accountability long before.

I don’t know what exactly happened in your life since the last time I saw you. I don’t know what changed your mind from the time I believe you wrote the following poem:

BORN A PRINCE
He was born to be a prince,
Born to walk with head held high,
But he went and sold his birthright,
To this day I know not why.
True, life wasn’t a bed of roses;
There was testing, there was fire.
But look and see what leaving’s got him–
He’s now wallowing in the mire.

How his father wept and sorrowed;
As he left, the queen looked on:
He deserted love and liberty,
Now his innocence is gone.
Why he left I still do wonder;
When I look, nothing I see.
But then the grass always looks greener,
And there’s more fruit on another tree.

He will return, I promise;
From days past it’s been foretold:
Train a child in God’s instruction,
And he’ll return before he’s old.
Now remember this, my children,
If one day you wish to roam:
When life’s pages close and finish,
It’s been said, “You’ll all come home.”

All I know is that I am now praying daily for you, and for the many others who have left the Family, no matter what their current frame of mind. I think you failed to realize that this attack on our faith and beliefs could do nothing but make us stronger. “If this counsel or this work be of men, it will come to naught, but if it be of God, you cannot stand against it.” I guess time will tell the tale, but I’m not worried, because I know the ending of this story was written before time began. As for me and my house; we will serve the Lord.

As sincere as I’ll ever be,

Bonita.

PS. The following poem I wrote some time ago for a friend still “deciding”:

WE WHO LIE BETWEEN
The fissures widen between Heaven and Hell
All those betwixt who ever dwell
They live therein, but choose their paths
Toward Heaven’s beauty, or Hell’s sad wrath
We who live between the planes
And know the truth still must explain
Continue believing the truth you know
They answers they seek, dude, you can show
Just remember the difference, the love they still seek
The same love we know, we can share with the weak
The lions fight the lambs, who will share the fight?
Who will actually care which side is in the right?
They don’t know why, how, when or where
We know the answers, ‘cuz we’ve been there
Will we yet try to help them face the light?
And bestow to them the gift of sight?
Do we care that time is short, and still they seek?
Will we yet stoop to aid the weak?
So strong they are in their own eyes
But in the night, truth they realize
And cry out from their lonely place
“Is there real truth, so lies erase?”
We know the love for which they would pray
Let us give them this love; for that reason—stay
For such fulfillment is only in doing this
In Heaven it’s a thing you won’t want to miss
But then will it be too late?
Will you be ever regretting the choice of your fate?
Let this not be the road you take
Hold on to love, for Heaven’s sake!
And give it out to those in need
Free them from the endless greed
Open their eyes with truth from above
Show them the path that leads to love

Bonita is a second-generation member of The Family International

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 5th, 2005 and is filed under Speaking Out, By Age, New/rejoined Members, With Photo, 18 to 24, Archived, Asia. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.