My Gift to You
I communicated with Alex's sister Jackie a lot after Alex's passing. She wanted to know what happened to him. I didn't like to talk about what happened out loud so I wrote her letters, several letters, trying to explain every crazy thing that happened. I told her all my theories of what I thought might be wrong with him. I think I came up with about ten diagnoses that he may have had: Depression, Bipolar, Paranoia, Anxiety, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, Schizophrenia, Multiple or Dissociative Identity Disorder, Arrested Development and Dementia. I didn't leave out that demons were involved and she absolutely believed it. She would always say when Alex was spiraling downwards, "I don't know who that is, but that's not my brother." Writing to her helped me to try to sort everything out.
Meanwhile she went to a Suicide support group in order to help her cope. I really thought that was a bad idea because I had been to Autism support groups and it never helped because all you hear about is other people's miserable experiences as if you don't have enough baggage of your own to worry about. Whenever Jackie and I talked on the phone she would give me the full details of each of her meetings. She told me story after story of other people's experiences with relatives that committed suicide. I honestly couldn't stand to hear the stories but I endured it because she thought it was helping her. I don't know how filling your head with images of all those different ways people killed themselves is helpful. To me it's just like adding to your own nightmare. I hated thinking about death whether it be my own dear Alex or anyone else. I never even liked to watch any type of TV show or movie if death was a part of the story line. For some odd reason, when I was very young and had not yet had much life experience in general I told God one day that the very worst thing that I think can ever happen to someone was that the person they loved killed themselves and I told God for him to never let that happen to me. Well, it happened to me anyway much later on in life. But, I can't say God didn't warn me. When I was first getting to know Alex I heard that still small inaudible voice in my head tell me in my thoughts, "Are you sure you want to be in a relationship with this man? What you fear most could happen." That's when I told God that I loved Alex so much that I was willing to take that risk.
After I said all that could be said about how messed up Alex was to Jackie I was left with nothing else to talk about. So I decided that it was time I started witnessing to her about Jesus because Alex wanted her to come to Christ. It was one of Pedro's biggest desires. His sister was a Muslim who once told me that God didn't have a Son. Actually, before Pedro even passed away I was working on trying to witness to Jackie. I had purchased her a book by Nabeel Qureshi called Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus.
Alex had been trying to witness to his sister for many years. She had a clever way of always shutting the conversation down by looking at your firmly and saying, "I have my religion and you have yours." I remember going to dinner with her and when we'd pray she'd abstain from even praying with us. I didn't know how I was going to get through to her. In Alex's last month of torment I had actually shown him the book I wanted Jackie to read. He looked at me disappointedly and said, "I asked her if she wanted to read it and she says she doesn't want to. She's never going to read it."
I found that since Alex passed that I was able to get away with telling her about the resurrection of the dead passages in the Bible and how the Bible describes that we will be transformed to be immortal. I found writing to her more effective than speaking to her because she couldn't shut me down that way. So I wrote out an entire passage of Corinthians about how our bodies will be transformed.
She then decided to read Alex the Bible whenever she went to go visit his gravesite. I was just thankful that his suffering and death didn't push her away from Christianity and the Bible. She told me that Alex would ask her to read him the Bible in his final days because he couldn't read it, so she'd sit there and read it to him. She knew how near and dear the Bible was to him so although she had a different religion she read him the Bible even after his death.
I thought to myself... doesn't she realize that both religions cannot be true at the same time because they contradict each other? Maybe she didn't realize that. I asked God for him to give me a sign of some sort or show me an opening of a way I could actually witness to her and explain the gospel to her. That opportunity came one day when she told me on the phone as she always does, "I love you my dear sister." But, she stopped and said, "I mean my sister as in your sister by relation, not sister in the Lord."
I said to myself, "That's it, I have to do something about this." So then I started writing her letters again because she could not shut me down this way with the old, "I have my religion and you have yours" statement as a way to shut me up.
I saw that unlike Alex who had been mainly an emotionally based person, that she was a more logical person that was interested in facts. So I risked alienating her by starting with telling her that I noticed she said I wasn't her sister in the Lord. Then I told her that Islam isn't true and here's why. I wrote her at least ten page letters by hand every time I wrote to her. I started with something small, which were passages in the Quran about how a woman's value is worth less than that of a man and a passage that said it was okay for a man to beat his wife. She didn't seem to be bothered by that complaint and smiled when I saw her and said, "Well, that just means tapping the woman lightly, nothing rough."
She liked to come and visit and be with me and my children so I decided to expose her to some Christian things I thought that maybe she could tolerate that wasn't directly a church service. So, one day we went on a two hour drive just to see the Christian comedian Tim Hawkins. I told her that Alex had really liked this comedian, so she went with us. The picture below is of Jackie and my children when we went to Lake George to see a Tim Hawkins show. I was surprised at how she roared with laughter at Tim's jokes. She really enjoyed the show so much. It was nice to see her laugh after what she'd been through. I thought to myself, Alex would have been glad I cheered his sister up a little bit. On the drive home at night both Jackie and I saw a shooting star in the sky and wondered if that was some sort of sign.
One day I broke the news to her that I was interested in moving to another State. She was very disappointed. Truth was, it was too depressing living in a house that Alex and I were supposed to have spent our lives together in. I needed a change of scenery. I had lived in the middle of nowhere in Chateaugay New York. I wanted better opportunities for myself and my children as well.
I was scouting out different States to live in and took trips to go check things out. There was a Christian Prophecy Conference going on in Ohio so I invited Jackie to go with us although it was a long trip. It was yet another opportunity to expose her to some sort of Christianity without it being a regular Church service. We went to the GoTherefore conference. One of the speakers was Russ Dizdar. I explained to Jackie that Russ was one of the men I brought Alex to when we were seeking help. After the Conference was over I had a chance to speak with Russ and I told him what happened to Alex. Then Russ turned to me and said, "I don't think that he went to hell. I know that people do, but in his case, I really don't think he went to hell, he's with the Lord." I hadn't even mentioned anything other than stating that Alex ended his life. Maybe Russ knew I might have been worried about it. Russ said that when people have Dissociative Identity Disorder and things like that, there are other factors involved and he says they aren't in their right minds at the time. I introduced Russ to Jackie and she was glad to meet him and very impressed by the information he provided at the Conference. I did sense one thing about Russ. He didn't seem to be in very good health. His face was very red and I sensed maybe he had hypertension. This was around the time of the Pandemic just starting. I learned later on after the Pandemic went full swing that he and his wife died in the hospital due to Covid. At that time they were treating people with dangerous drugs and respirators which actually killed the people. I knew it was a scheme of Satan to take a General of the faith out. Like I said, even the best of them sometimes lose their life in this spiritual battle.
During our stay at the hotel Jackie and the kids and I went swimming in the indoor pool. That's when Jackie confessed that she couldn't pray anymore. I really didn't know what she meant by that. I was worried that maybe it was due to her finally being upset with God about what happened to Alex. It turned out later that I was wrong. It was because she was doubting Islam. So, I was actually glad about that. I didn't pressure her to accept Christianity I just kept hammering on why Islam was a false religion. For example, I asked her why the Quran's version of heaven was so sexualized. Why do the men get promised women with big breasts and young boys to wait on them while they drink wine? I compared that to the Bible version of heaven. Another question I asked is why the Quran says the gospels and the Torah are true and given by Allah, yet the Gospels totally contradict Islam? I just kept chipping away. As another summer finally came I told God one day while I was weeding my garden. "You know, if Jackie comes to you and accepts you and becomes saved that would really cheer me up and help me get through this ordeal. Can you do this miracle for me?" I also kept imagining how happy Pedro would be about this. I wanted his sister to be there with us in heaven. If there was one thing I knew without a doubt was that if a person doesn't accept the Son of God, there's no way they are going to make it to heaven. Islam is a system of making it to heaven by your own good works. But, the Bible says that "there is no one that's righteous and our righteousness is as dirty rags" and that, "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God." We need Jesus, he provided the atonement for our sins.
I gave her the book by Nabeel, but she still hadn't read it, so I decided that maybe if I gave her a book written by a Muslim that is still a Muslim, that she'll read it. I had been listening to an Imam called Imam Tawhidi who was going around exposing the violent past of Islam and he was also exposing the violent Quran passages along with other books called Hadiths that they considered sacred. I was pretty shocked to find out the bloody history of Muslims killing Muslims due to their own theological infighting between Shia and Muslim factions. This book she was willing to read. It was just another chipping away hoping that the pillars of Islam would some day fall. I kept praying against a spirit of Islam and Allah as well. Then finally, one day she decided to read the book by Nabeel called Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus. Well, that did it. She told me that after reading that book she was officially out of Islam.
I don't remember specifically explaining to her about the basic tenants of Christianity. I think she already figured it out when I did comparisons with Islam versus Christianity. She was also familiar with years of Alex's witnessing to her as well. Finally one day she told me that she decided to get baptized. She said that Nabeel's book explained to her the Trinity in a way that she could understand.
I think it also might have helped that I gave her some Christian movies to watch like, "The Case for Christ." I traveled to Canada for her baptism. I was very happy about it but I was surprised at how upset I felt that Alex wasn't here to witness this in person. I was upset with him. Alex's cousins Sonya and Jake were thrilled and got a big boost in their enthusiasm. They wanted to come to the baptism too. Below are a few pictures from that wonderful day. A day that Alex had prayed for, for many years. I was hoping that maybe he could have seen it from heaven. I know that the Bible says that the angels rejoice in heaven over every sinner that repents, so at the very least Alex would have had to find out about it. I knew that would make him exceedingly happy. I wanted to be able to do something for him.
Whenever I wrote his sister a letter I asked God if it would be okay if Alex was allowed to get a copy of my letter up there in heaven. I don't know if that's allowed, but if it is, I thought I'd make the request anyway. When I went to go visit Maria I brought two binders to put all the letters in because there was so many so I neatly compiled them into these binders. I guess it would have made a good book. This was the only thing I could do for Alex now. Below is a post he made to Facebook way back when.
God is faithful to our prayers we prayed, even after we are gone. If only he could have been here.
Click here to read next Chapter - Jackie's Deliverance