Paula's Miraculous Christmas Cookie Basket
By Stephen Yulish

Every year for the past eighteen years at this time of year, Paula takes out
the same beautiful Christmas Cookie Basket that I gave to her way back in
1989. The amazing and yet obviously disconcerting thing was that I was living
with another woman at the time! What was the big deal, I had asked myself? I
know. I know.  So sue me!
Let me tell you a wonderful Christmas story, an amazing, godly love story, of
a beauty (Paula) and a beast (yours truly) that is truly stranger than
fiction. Who knew?
Paula and my coworker (we both worked at the same company in Phoenix), Jeffrey
Kastner's wife Robin, made these beautiful holiday cookie baskets in her
garage for extra money. Sure she was Jewish, but she made Christmas as well as
Chanukah baskets. Hey, money is money. That's my people.
I decided to get one for Paula. We had known each other at work since 1987,
although we had never dated (she was a believing Christian and I was an
unbelieving Jew who was living with another woman), although I had tried once
(maybe twice?) but she had rebuffed me-imagine that? I had told Paula that I
could have her during the day and my girlfriend at night. Paula had thought at
the time that I was nuts, crazy, off the wall, at least contemptible at best.
Whatever! Imagine that?
We had become increasingly drawn to one another, however, especially when
against all odds I had accepted the Lord in October of 1988 after I had a
series of visions and a dream and I was born again. Even though the Christian
men at work like Philip and Chuck had been witnessing to me relentlessly for a
year, I had not been receptive or convinced. Then God had revealed Himself to
me directly, and I had believed!
But the problem was that I had not shown any outward change in my behavior in
the year since (i.e. moving out from my girlfriend's apartment, going to
church or reading my new Bible). I had as they say dirty diapers as any
newborn does. I knew the Lord in my heart and had seen Him myself in my divine
revelations, but this stiff necked Jew could not nor would not change easily.
Does anyone? I was a newborn Christian and I kept on messing up (my diapers).
I still do occasionally even now, but I'm sure none of you ever does that.
I had contemplated moving out from my "roommate" but, because of health issues
which were acute back then as they are once again today, I was fearful that if
it did not work out with Paula I would have to fend for myself. That was even
though my "girlfriend" had told me that if I ever needed real help (as I do
today) she would just leave. Her best friend in college had married a guy who
had gotten MS and died soon after.
Boy was I ever blind and stupid! She also told me that she would not marry me
because she had some money in the bank and she did not want it to go my boys
if we married and I died. Oy vay! She was clearly Jewish. I had often gone to
Paula as my confidant and told her about the outrageous statements of this
woman. Paula had advised me to get out. We had become good friends. I had
gotten very upset when guys came to see her work or sent her flowers. I told
her that they were not right for her. When she had asked me who was right for
her, I had told her, me. She answered 'yeah right, you are living with someone
else!' Persnickety wasn't she? Ha!
Well, I bought that cookie basket for Paula and they delivered it to her great
surprise. Her mother was living with her at that time and helping her take
care of her two daughters, Kendra and Andrea. I had met her mother a couple of
times at the office Christmas party and she apparently had also helped pray me
into the Kingdom. Her second husband, Joe Labensky, had been a Jew (believer)
who owned several businesses in a small town in Oklahoma. Anyway, Geneva loved
the Jews and Israel. After I got saved, thanks in part to the efforts of
Philip and Chuck as well as her daughter Paula, she had begun to pray for
Paula and me to get together. Yeah right, fat chance, especially given my
imprudent behavior. But God had a plan for my life.
When my three sons came to visit me that Christmas of 1989, I took them to see
Paula and Geneva. I don't know what motivated me but I got her address from
someone and just went over there when my girlfriend was at work. The boys
loved Paula and Geneva who made them French fries and talked about Israel.
The next month, January of 1990, Paula had finally had enough. She said later
that she was beginning to really care for me but I was not responding. She
used to be a secretary at Phoenix First Assembly under Tommy Barnett and that
was still where she went to church. One day in late January, she had gone to
the mountain behind the church and told the Lord that He should find someone
else to take care of me because it was getting too painful. Unbelievably, at
that same time, I found out later, I was at Acapulco Bay Beach Company
Restaurant with my girlfriend somehow mouthing the words that it was over
between us (it actually had been for quite a while) and I wanted to move out.
As soon as Paula had given me back to the Lord, He had given me back to her.
Can you believe that?
I moved out and got an apartment. I waited till the end of the month because I
had already paid the rent. So sue me! When I had told the boys, they were
elated and told me that never really liked that other woman who had been mean
to them. Josh asked me if I was going to marry Paula. Out of the mouths of
babes!
Our first date was January 25, 1990 and we went to dinner at a fancy
restaurant but neither of us ate very much, we just stared at one another.
Then we went to a Friday night service at Jewish Voice Messianic Ministries.
My Christian clients had given me their magazine for years and I had always
just thrown it away. Shelley Volk was the leader but he soon left to lead a
Church in Paradise Valley. Since he was Jewish, they soon had the largest
group of saved Jews in Phoenix. We followed him there. I began going to church
and praying and reading my bible. I took my first communion there also (with
matzo).
God knew that I needed help in my new life with Him so He had brought in the
reinforcements, aka Paula and her mother Geneva, to truly disciple me. I went
over there every night for dinner and Geneva even washed my clothes. She
shrank everything, bless her heart. Geneva, Paula and I talked about the Lord
and the Bible every night after we blessed the food which I had never done
before.
I proposed to Paula on March 2 and again against all odds she accepted.  She
told me that she would marry me in spite of my MS as opposed to my ex
girlfriend who would not marry me because of my MS. I even got down on my knee
and asked Geneva for her hand. Our boss who also was a Christian asked Paula
if she really wanted to marry me. He was not convinced that I was truly a
Christian because as I said my outward behavior had not changed. There was no
fruit. Paula told him that she knew my heart and I was truly a born again,
Believer. That woman has real discernment. Watch out!
We asked Shelley Volk to marry us but he wanted us to have premarital
counseling which of course was the correct thing to do. I said counseling,
shmounseling, 'forget about it'. We want to get married ASAP, know what I
mean? Paula asked Associate Pastor of Phoenix First Assembly, Jack Wallace,
whom she had previously worked for, to marry us. He did a couple of counseling
sessions and married us on March 30, 1990 in front of the fountains at Phoenix
First.
Given all of my troubled past and the haste of our marriage without premarital
counseling it should never have worked. Throw in my inability to work much and
all the financial as well as health obstacles and you would think that this
marriage was doomed from the start. Well, going on 18 years later, it is
stronger than ever which shows that God was in it from the beginning. Paula
and I consider each other our beshert, our soul mate. It has been just the two
of us and Jesus from day one. He has been the center of our lives and our Rock
and our Redeemer. We could not have done it without Him. And, as all of you
who know her, my wife Paula is not only a beautiful, sweet, loving, woman but
she is truly a Proverbs 31 godly woman. Right? She has had to go back to work
at NAU (new age university) and never has complained as well as having to care
for me as my health has deteriorated. God had a plan all along. I truly love
that precious woman and thank God for her.
First, the Lord gave me, this poor, pathetic, lost, schnook, the saving grace
of His Son but then He gave me Paula. I have been doubly blessed and know that
it was His grace and mercy that gave me both, not my deeds which were
deplorable. Remember, I gave Paula that Christmas Cookie Basket while I was
still living with another woman. OY! Can you imagine?
Only by the grace of God did we ever get married. Who knew? Geneva was
ecstatic at our marriage and I became the favorite son in law even though
Paula's sisters' husbands, Chuck and Bob, were fine Christian men who did
everything for her. But I was a Jew. I loved that woman. On her deathbed in
1996, she screamed out for her doctor and nurses to come when I showed up.
"Doctor, Doctor, this is my Jew son in law", she had yelled. Her last words to
Paula were to take care of me because I was a Jew and special to God. Whenever
Paula and I had gotten into an argument, Geneva would blame Paula even when I
admitted to starting it. That little spirit filled Baptist lady was exactly
what I needed at the time.
Even though it is made of real cookies that cookie basket it is still intact
and has not decayed even after 18 years just as our marriage has not either.
Okay, Paula sprayed it with polyurethane. Sue me! Maybe she should spray me
also. What are you laughing at!! Ha!
People often ask me if I believe in miracles. What they are really saying is
do I have the faith to believe that God will heal me. Every time I look upon
that Christmas Cookie Basket, my faith in God's miracles is reaffirmed. Every
morning that I wake up and glance upon that beautiful, spirit filled angel
sleeping next to me, my faith in God's miracles is also reaffirmed. If God can
reach down and touch this once lost and perishing sinner and forgive me and
give me eternal life and then give me heaven here on this earth with Paula, He
can do anything. I believe!
Merry Christmas

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