Almita Roa was named after her mother, Alma, who was from a devout Catholic family, although she herself did not heartily embrace the religion of her parents. Almita’s dad, Miguel believed in a Superior Being, and trusted in karma, but because of his prosperous job in architecture, he didn’t care to get involved with a god or religion of any kind.
However, Miguel and Alma were both in agreement on one issue concerning religion. They did not want anything to do with Christianity. Alma, especially, had seen enough hypocrisy in one Christian lady, to never want to meet another Christian.
When Almita started kindergarten, she became friends with Carla, a girl whose parents were Christians. Carla’s mom began inviting Alma and Almita to go to church with her, and although Alma politely turned down the offer for herself, she saw no harm in letting her oldest daughter go.
Almita loved going to Sunday school. She would arrive home from church and with wide-eyed earnestness, her dark brown hair framing her expressive little face, she would implore, “Mama, you have to read me the Bible or I’ll get all dried up like a plant without water.”
She continued to accompany Carla and her family to church every Sunday, where she learned more things about the Bible. Although Almita knew God existed, she didn’t know something was separating her from Him.
When Almita was 9, her mother began attending church with her. Carla’s mother, Lupita, had a big impact on Alma’s life. Her servant’s heart and sincere love were not lost on her and soon she came to place her trust in Jesus as her Savior.
As the time approached for Almita to enter high school, she piously imagined herself reading the Bible at school and sharing God with other students. But that never happened. On her first day of school, she was introduced to a whole different world. A world she found fun and fascinating. She felt sorry that she had wasted so many years thinking about God when she could have been filling her life with excitement and pleasure. From one day to the next, the girl who had thought of herself sharing God with her fellow students was now doubting He even existed. Perhaps what the Bible said really wasn’t true. Even though she was now rejecting God’s existence, Almita still considered herself a very good person.
Now that she had taken God out of her life, Almita began to live as she thought best. Her parents tried their hardest to protect her from herself. However, she got away with all she could. What she wasn’t allowed to do, soon caused rebellion in her heart. That rebellion began to manifest itself in everything she did. It affected her relationship with her parents, with her siblings, and it even affected her grades in school.
As the second year of high school rolled around, Miguel and Alma decided to put Almita into a Christian school. Perhaps it would help their daughter get back on track, they thought. It was a smaller school with higher moral standards than the one she had previously been attending. Surely, it would help. Besides, her childhood friend Carla, was enrolled there too. When Almita found out, she was furious. How could her parents dare to take her out of her old school, away from her friends?
During her first week at the Christian school, Almita was appalled to find that Carla, the same girl who had once been a good friend, was defaming her to all the other kids, telling them that she was not a good person and that they should beware of her.
A very upset Almita came home from school that day. She told her mom that no one would talk to her. Alma spoke to Carla’s mom about it, and Carla supposedly “fixed” things, but the damage had been done and Almita was hurt and angry. She wasn’t sure if she was angry with God or with Christians.
The Christian school was actually very similar to her former school, and the more Almita saw hypocrisy in many so-called “Christians,” the more she was convinced that this was all a big farce. Soon Almita’s emotions were totally in control of her life. It was not long before she began implementing her own solutions—whenever she felt angry or sad, she would cut herself. At this point her parents decided to move to a different city, much to Almita’s chagrin. They were so desperate, that they concluded there had to be a better school where they could send their daughter, than the one in Mexico City. Morelia seemed the best option, so they packed up their things and went to the beautiful city of Morelia, due west of Mexico City.
Almita’s grandparents lived in Morelia so they would now be able to spend time with them. Almita’s mother Alma was very nervous about seeing her own mother again, because she was now a Christian, and she could only imagine the reaction of her hyper-Catholic family. Yet she felt the obligation to share the gospel with them.
Upon their arrival, Alma went to visit her mother. Over the phone, some weeks before, Alma had mentioned she had something to tell her. Doña Cruz responded, “Ok. Well, I have something to tell you too.” When Alma arrived at her old house, she greeted her mother nervously and went inside. “Well, daughter, what do you need to tell me?” asked Doña Cruz as she sat in her favorite easy chair. “Oh, you first, Mother.” Alma answered hopefully. After several tries at getting the other to say what was on her mind, Alma finally took the plunge. “I’ve trusted in Jesus as my Savior, Mother. I’m a Christian.” She winced inwardly, waiting for the reaction, but what came next absolutely shocked her. “Oh! I’m so happy Alma! You see, I trusted in Jesus too, and I have felt a burden to tell you!” What a joyful day for Almita’s mother and grandmother as they both realized they had found the same Savior! But Almita’s defiant heart was still an increasing burden for the whole family.
As Almita enrolled in yet another school, her depression and discontentment only increased. On that first day of high school several years before, she was sure she had been missing out on a world of fun. She blamed God for it. Now, she had still not found the fun and fulfillment she longed for; but she was sure that if only she had a phone, she would be happy. The phone came and when that didn’t fill her needs, she was convinced if only she had a boyfriend, she could be happy. Then it was if only she had permission to go and do whatever she wanted, she could truly be happy. This cycle continued for a long time, and after trying to satisfy her hungry soul with all these things and many more, Almita went on to her next year of school knowing one thing—she was not happy! She was depressed, lonely and empty.
At school, Almita found people like her, who were lonely and empty, so they all became friends. Around that time, a girl named Libni came into Almita’s life. She was the first Christian Almita had ever met who really lived out what she claimed. She didn’t use bad language; she was kind and considerate to all her classmates and she kept her promises. Almita found this interesting, but she didn’t think much about it at the time. Her life kept on as it was, only because she found no other way to live. She lived to have fun, and she went to church with her parents so that they would not bother her.
There were times when Alma would ask Almita, “Honey, have you really trusted in Jesus as your Savior?” “Yes!” She would always answer. She just wanted to avoid a confrontation with her mother, and she knew what people wanted to hear.
After a very rough period in his life, including the loss of his job, Almita’s dad, Miguel Roa came to the Savior and trusted in His work for him on the cross. On that special night, he prayed, “God, I’ve been trying to live my whole life the way I thought was right, and the way I thought was best for me, and everything has turned out wrong. I know it’s because I don’t have You. I know I don’t have You because of my sins. And I know You sent Jesus to pay for me. I accept You. Please help me!”
This marked the beginning of radical changes in the Roa household. Miguel was willing to change every area in his life which the Lord showed him needed to be changed. He stopped listening to the kind of music he used to, he stopped watching bad movies, he became a better manager of his finances. All these were changes Almita didn’t like, but they challenged her doubts about God’s existence. Surely only God could make the changes Almita was seeing in her family, but her anger still burned toward her parents for not allowing her to do the things she was sure would make her happy.
With nowhere else to go, Miguel and Alma did the best thing they knew to do—they cried out to the Lord for their rebellious daughter. They were not the only ones praying for Almita. Many others were continually lifting up prayers to the throne of grace on behalf of this depressed and empty teenager.
After much prayer and counsel, Miguel and Alma decided to take Almita out of public school and begin homeschooling. They felt the situation was so desperate that they were willing to take this radical step, just two weeks before her graduation! God was continually trying to show Almita who He was, but every time, she would resist His Spirit with the thought that God and her parents didn’t want her to be happy. When she was taken out of school, she expected to receive messages from concerned friends asking what had happened, but the absolute silence was enough to drive her mad. The only one who showed a little concern was her boyfriend, but even he did not react in the way she had hoped. Never in her life had she felt so empty and lonely. Then fear set in. Terrible fear that someone would come in the night and kill her. She felt lost, but she wasn’t willing for anyone to tell her where to go. She wanted to die, but she was too afraid of the possibility of there being a Hell to take her own life. In short, she was wretchedly despondent.
BUT THEN CAME JESUS…
With no desire to tell her mom of her fear, she decided to open a dusty Bible which was in her room. Perhaps it would hold the answers. Before, she had believed that God would never want to forgive her for all the bad things she had done in her life, but as she began reading the Bible, she found that God longed to forgive her. She learned what mercy meant—not giving us what we deserve. She accepted that she did deserve Hell, eternal separation from God; she deserved punishment. She finally understood that God wanted to forgive her, that Jesus had died to do just that, and that He really could make her life new in spite of the mess she had made of it.
Verses like Isaiah 54:4 came to life as she read, “Fear not, for you will not be put to shame; and do not feel humiliated, for you will not be disgraced; but you will forget the shame of your youth, and the reproach of your widowhood you will remember no more. For your husband is your Maker, whose name is the LORD of hosts; and your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel, who is called the God of all the earth.” That is what she longed for—to “forget the shame of her youth.” What really amazed her was that God was willing to forget it too and to separate it from her “as far as the east is from the west.” And all this through Jesus!
Almita had found what she had been looking for ever since that first day in High School—true happiness. Far from finding it in worldly passions, she found it in Jesus, who had died so that she could be forgiven from her sin and restored to a perfect relationship with Him. Never in her wildest dreams could she have imagined such happiness as she felt now.
Almita’s life is another living proof that God is real and that He changes lives. People may argue with Christians about their beliefs, but no one can argue against a real-life testimony.
Epilogue: In 2015, the Roa family received the unexpected news that Miguel had liver cirrhosis and cancer. This was a hard blow for everyone including Almita. Days before she heard the diagnosis, she had read Psalm 112:7 which says, “He will not fear evil tidings; his heart is steadfast, trusting in the LORD.” She breathed a sigh of relief as she thought, “I won’t receive evil tidings.” Then she read it again and realized that the verse didn’t say, “We will not receive evil tidings,” but rather, “we can be steadfast if we trust in the Lord in spite of evil tidings.” This verse soon became her stronghold through the painful and slow process of her dad’s sickness and ultimate departure.
Neither Miguel nor Alma’s testimony was lost upon their four children. Miguel would never complain but rather thank the Lord for the food he could eat and that he could spend time with his family. He was a bold witness for Christ. Although naturally a reserved man, he didn’t allow this to keep him from talking to everyone who would come to visit. One day, his brother-in-law Juan, went to the hospital to see him. Miguel lost no time in begging Juan to be reconciled to God. By the end, both the brother-in-law and Miguel were in tears. Miguel, because of the hardness of Juan’s heart, and Juan because of this man lying on his deathbed, begging him to believe in his God. As Almita saw this passion for lost souls in her dad, she was stirred to use even her last breath to tell people about the Lord.
She also learned a lot from her mother. Alma had a true servant’s heart, and she showed it through her faithful love and tender care for Miguel, all those months as he was less and less capable of caring for himself. She showed Almita, Michelle, Johana and Isaac what true love looked like. It wasn’t just a feeling you have when you are about to get married. Serving your spouse unconditionally, while they lie on their deathbed, without expecting to receive anything back—this is true love.
After several months of both pain and growth in the Lord, the Roa family gathered to their father’s bedside to say goodbye. On April 11, 2016, the day before Isaac’s 17th birthday, Miguel went to be with his beloved Savior. Through it all, they saw the faithfulness and care of their Heavenly Father who never left them. When Miguel’s sickness began, the family decided together never to doubt the fact that God is good. And to this day, they still live by that conviction. They continue to serve the Lord devotedly, bearing witness to the fact that God causes ALL things to work together for good to those who love God. (Rom. 8:28).
Almita went on to marry Aron García, her high school sweetheart whom the Lord drew to Himself at a different time and through different circumstances. But that is another story.