More than the Sum by Fran Riedemann Read Free Book Online Page B

felt a hand on my back pushing me forward.  I even looked behind me to see who it was who pushed me.  To this day if I think about it, I can feel the pressure on my back.”  She smiled one of those far away smiles that someone in love might have when they were talking about a romantic getaway. 
    “ So you quit flying because of that one night?”  Brittany asked, incredulous, and more than curious at how that experience could so completely alter one’s destiny.
    “ Well, no, not exactly. I now believe God had already begun making me more and more uncomfortable with the compromises that I continued to make in order to keep flying.  But, yes, that night was what propelled me to plan my exit. I quit flying that same month and I have never looked back. I knew I had been forgiven, and I wanted to reclaim the years that I traded away for God for him.  While I had no regrets while I was living the lifestyle, after that night I was not only convicted, but I knew that I needed to put as much distance between the temptations and myself as soon as possible.”
    Gloria further explained how after leaving her career in the air she decided to go back to school to get her degree.  She promptly joined the university’s choir, partly because she missed singing, and partly because it was an easy three credit hours.  Her choir director began mentoring her, detecting her exceptional voice. He asked if she would mind his sharing recordings of her singing with some business associates that he was acquainted with who he recalled were on the hunt for acts for some of their events. So, with his help, she began singing professionally, earning enough to keep her head above water. 
    One of the CD’s took on a life of its own and found its way to someone who was looking for someone to bring a musical element into her ministry. That opportunity led to the next door opening, and the next. She now had her own ministry named “Out from the Ashes”, where she both sang, and taught principles of healing and wholeness through receiving God’s “Shalom” found in faith in Jesus Christ. 
    Before the evening ended, email addresses and phone numbers were exchanged, along with promises to keep in touch.
    It was evident the Stones were extremely happy the two women hit it off. Later Brittany told Jeanne that she was a matchmaker after all. Brittany returned home that night feeling hopeful, but  in a way she had never felt before nor expected to.   
    For the first time, and quite unexpectedly, she considered there might be a purpose for what she had been through.
     
     
     

 
     
     
     
                                                                  Chapter Seven
     
     
     
     
    If Brittany was pondering ways of finding purpose for her own life, her brother Brent wasted no time in seizing the day by moving in with her mother.  He is a Carpe Diem kind of guy was Brittany’s first thought, after being informed by a mutual friend that he had moved into the family home with her mother. 
    After confronting her mother the excuse she offered Brittany, apparently feeling the need to fabricate one for her benefit, was that his being there was only temporary and totally justifiable because Brent was trying to save up money for the start-up costs needed for him to open a business of his own. When Brittany pressed her mother for an explanation about what kind of business he would be opening her answer was so lame Brittany bet her cat a night on the town that her brother would never leave. She couldn’t help but wonder how Sarah felt about the new arrangement.
    There was only one other time she and Sarah saw each other, and that was on Easter Sunday, when another family gathering was attempted. Brittany, forecasting how stiff the day  would inevitably be, would have preferred to be anywhere else. But, her curiosity to see how the living arrangements were proceeding with a wedding about