Early Morning Texts and Hurting People

This morning about 7:15AM I was awakened by the Sherwood Forest trumpet that is my text message notification. Reluctantly and with some trepidation, I rolled out of bed to check the message thinking it was a friend with a prayer request or Sharon wanting to tell me something about the farm. But, it was a number I didn't know from the "931" area code with simple and innocuous salutation, "hey." My first thought was, "this must be some poor girl that slept someone they didn't really know and is reaching out." I am not sure why I thought that. I guess the hour of the morning and the greeting made brought that to mind.

I wasn't sure if I should respond or what to respond with. Finally, I responded with, "Who is this?" Part of my orginal thought was confirmed when she responded, "Ashley who is this?"

I suddenly put myself in her shoes, now she's panicked. The person she thought would respond warmly immediately didn't know who she was. Not sure what to say, I replied, "Chris...I think you have a wrong number."

This is where this gets strange, and shows this person's hurt even clearer, "Are you married." Now I'm thinking this girl has definitely slept with someone who gave her a bogus number. Since often "Chris" is often assumed to be a guy, I thought I'd clarify.

"I am a woman and I think someone gave you a wrong number."

Here's the "shake your head, sigh, and wonder how hurting this person must be" part of the story. She replied "this person told me you like women also."

My first instinct was to chastise whom I suddenly thought must be a teenager on a dare of some kind. My second instinct was not to dignify the question with an answer. So I didn't respond. My third instinct was to turn to the internet and see if I could at least figure out where this person was. I used a reverse look up to locate the person in TN.

Here's the really amazing part, she asked the question AGAIN.

The "mom" in me really wanted to chastise this girl for her rudeness, but I simply replied, "No. You have a wrong number."

I haven't heard from her since, thankfully.

As I have thought about this incident in the couple hours since, it caused me to post on Twitter, "You know, there's a lot of hurting people out there, say a prayer for them today." I know I am making a lot of mental leaps about this person who randomly "sexted" me this morning, about her age, her situation, her upbringing, but the one thing I do know for certain, this person is hurting. I'm pretty sure once I'd figured out I had a wrong number, I would have said I was sorry and stopped texting. But this person was so messed up inside that her hurt and embarrassment caused her to press into the "conversation." Wow. Hurt makes people do a crazy things.

So, Ashley, whoever and wherever you are, you were prayed for this morning. I prayed that God would make himself real to you and your hurt would find the Healer.