Sometimes the simplest act of kindness can be a holy demonstration of Jesus’ love. In this episode Gina has a conversation with Sheri Briggs about her story as a single mom encountering Jesus’ love through the generosity of strangers and the call to do the same for others who find themselves in places of vulnerability.
Gina and Sheri cover lots of ground from loving and learning from those that are the most vulnerable, to Sheri’s own story of losing her son and how her faith was challenged and changed.
Sheri Briggs is the founder of Bridge of Hope San Diego, a non-profit organization dedicated to strengthening families through transition. Transition can mean many things including families leaving homeless and domestic violence shelters or recovery homes, families facing crisis, and refugees relocating from around the world.
Messy Redemption
Gina:
You are the founder of Bridge of Hope in San Diego, and that’s an incredible ministry. That’s doing amazing things. I want to talk about all of it. So wherever you’d like to start, I would love for you to share your story.
You can start wherever you want. You can start with Bridge of Hope. What you do? The ministry that God’s given you, where that started, your personal story. I think listeners should hear it all, so wherever you wanna start.
Sheri:
I was a single mom that was starting out on my own. Put my foot on the path to follow Jesus. I was waiting on tables and I just needed help. I needed practical help back then. I didn’t have a backup plan. I just knew I needed to follow the Lord at this point and give my son a different life than I had. I was raised in an alcoholic home.
Also I grew up in a cult until I was 19. I had been married to a man in the cult. It was a very abusive relationship, very fitting to my upbringing. When my dad had gotten sober and kind of turned his life over to the Lord, the light started coming on about really what my life had been and the relationship I was in.
It was a complete redo of my childhood, basically. In that marriage, I had lost a child. I had a baby born prematurely and lost that child. God freed me of that marriage. I had been praying and asking the Lord to release me, but wasn’t going to go, because I was bound to this by my vow to the Lord in that marriage. He came to me and he had been unfaithful. I was released, praise God.
Then at that point, I began to serve the Lord in how I knew how. But coming out of a cult mentality and all that I had been raised in, it was very confusing. So little steps, little steps. Then I found myself in a relationship with a man and got pregnant right away. And it was that child, Nathan, who brought me to a place where I was going to serve, surrender and serve the Lord.
I put my foot on the path, single mom, determined to serve God and to break that generational programming and not pass it onto him. In that process of full surrender, God began to meet me in meeting my basic needs. I needed a bed. I needed pots and pans. I needed a table. I needed just to have what I needed for my son.
He began to meet me in those practical ways. Because of those things coming in, I saw that He loved me. I saw that He was intimately involved in my life, that this father-daughter relationship was beginning. As He began to continue to provide for us, I just took note of how important that was when you hear somebody say that they’ll pray for you. Or they’ll say “You made your bed, you’re gonna have to sleep in it.” That wasn’t helpful. I just needed some practical help.
When I began to take note of those things and seeing God provide, I just really felt like that was something God was planting in me for the future. Fast forward after that, I’m a single parent walking with Jesus learning the ways of the Lord. I met my husband who I have now. We have his, mine, and ours, so we had five kids all together.
We were walking with Jesus. We got involved in ministry and got involved in running a woman’s home recovery up in Oregon. I get to see more of the vision of what God gave me of these women that had put their foot on the path. They had given their lives to Jesus, walked away from their drugs and alcohol. They needed practical help too at some point.
Gina:
There’s so much significance in every step of your story. I love that you even recognized, you started serving Jesus, but this mentality of the cult that you grew up in informed how you started serving Him.
It was probably very, “I need to do this so that I can be here. I’m worthy.” But I also love the fact how God’s tender, loving kindness, and patience is with us and how He brings us along. He met you. You were in this thing trying to serve. You end up in a relationship, but God redeems that relationship with this baby that then brings you back.
The process of redemption is messy and not linear. It’s so sweet with the intimate intentionality, how Jesus met you in those places, and then to bring you to that place. I think sometimes we long for some supernatural encounter with Holy Spirit, and those things are beautiful, but for you, somebody giving you some pots and pans was such a radical demonstration of care.
You were seen, you were known and you were loved. As the church that’s so significant for us to understand. We don’t need to give someone the four spiritual laws or the Romans road, you know what I mean? When Jesus said “Give a cup of water in My name, there is anointing and power in that act of sweet unattached unencumbered demonstration of love.”
Sheri:
That’s what drew me to Him. That made me trust Him.
Stewarding a Vision
Gina:
Here you are. You’re in a new marriage, You are seeing now, that need wasn’t just yours, and you have realized that there’s so many people in that same place that you were.
Sheri:
I took note of that. Then we had a huge car crash happen while we were in ministry up in 1999. All my children were flown from the car. We should have all died that day. It was a huge crash. I had flown out of the car, my husband was underneath the van unconscious, my children were laid out like ducks next to me on this road. We’d flown about 50 feet and hit the concrete.
In that moment something rose up inside of me. The first words out of my mouth were “No weapon formed against me will prosper.” I felt this supernatural moment where I saw God literally save our lives. The Spirit of the living God rose up in this body. It wasn’t me. It was Him, and that was the biggest miracle. My children were alive. My husband was alive. We had some issues to deal with. However, the Spirit of God was so alive in me in that moment.
He took over and my faith catapulted like a rocket. I felt like I experienced the power of God that dwells within us, that takes over in the day of trouble. At that point after all of that, we were like, “What do you want us to do, Lord? We just experienced the supernatural power of God, this parting of the red sea. We’re alive. What do you want us to do?”
At that point we were just, “yes people”. We were part of this ministry, but God began to give me vision. I began to fill my journals, in the secret place, of this place that would have things that people need. God met me in those pots and pans, beds, linens, clothes. That place would be housing these things, and we would be able to access those that were in need, like I was.
I began to dream and vision visions, wake up in the middle of the night, draw pictures of this place for a few years, waiting and praying. I asked the Lord, “Do I share right now? No, this is just with You and me right now.” Just dreaming, and vision was coming.
Gina:
That’s so important. I love that. There can be a lot of pressure for people that if they have an idea or a dream, then it needs to be birthed in a certain way, in a certain time. I love that you were able to take the time to dream. You said “No, I’m not telling anyone. This is between You and me Jesus.” Because sometimes that’s where it needs to stay.
When a baby’s in the mama’s womb, there’s a reason for that nine months. That forming and that knitting together. Let’s take another analogy, like the seed under the soil that germination. There’s so much that happens under the soil before it ever breaks the surface. There’s so much that’s happening under the soil.
I think a lot of us, oftentimes, especially nowadays, we’re impatient and there’s so much we want to see now and the patience to let that germinate and let the work be done underground before it breaks the soil. That’s really cool.
Sheri:
His way is perfect. His timing is perfect. We’d had a car accident where there was some things we had to still dealing with. I was a mother. His way is easy. His joke is easy. He’s a gentle and good Dad. And I had learned that over the years,. He’s giving this vision, but let me build the house. Years of dreaming and filling out, filling in my journals.
It was one day at a prayer meeting in 2004, where these women asked me and invited me to come. And I’m now not in Oregon anymore. I’m here in San Diego. They wanted to pray for me at the end of the service. They had a word of knowledge. They saw and were praying and seeing the things that were in my journal, that no one knew about.
They asked, “Do you know what we’re talking about? Does this make sense?” I said, “Oh yeah, it does.” And that’s what I needed. I trusted the Lord. I went home and I said, “Honey, I think we’re going to start this thing.” And He goes, “What are we going to start?” I go ,”Well, I kind of shared.” I hadn’t shared much, because I really wanted to hear the Lord and wait for Him. My husband goes, “Well, what, how?” And I go “I don’t know.”
Then I asked the Lord, “Do I find the women that are in this need and then find the stuff? Or do I find the stuff then the find the women?” He goes, “Don’t worry about it.” Somehow, I began to connect with the women that were in need and God would provide and open the door for me to lead a Bible study with women coming off of the streets. That’s how it started and it’s been going for 17 years.
Sheri Briggs is the founder of Bridge of Hope San Diego
Check the rest of this conversation Love That Learns and Serves, El Roi – The God Who Sees
Check out the Dwell Meditations
