Hattie Kauffman spoke at the latest
Mastermedia NYC event, and shared the story she kept buried for decades. While the Emmy-award-winning journalist was interviewing leaders of state, Olympians and astronauts she was still reeling from the pain of growing up in a family split by alcoholism. Her parents left her and her six siblings alone as the utilities slowly turned off: gas, electricity and eventually water.
Hungry for provision and stability she rose quickly in the ranks of television journalists, becoming the first Native American ever to file a report on a national network evening news broadcast. She was soon given a blank check to cover any stories anywhere in the world for Good Morning America. As with
my bride, Hattie found it all leaving her empty inside. She turned to alcohol, and then to AA, but each bandaid she put on her soul couldn't bring the real healing.
Then one day she was in a hotel and sensed a hand on her forehead, like a Parent's warm touch. When she opened her eyes it was gone. The next day she tried to replicate everything that had led up to that moment in order to repeat the experience, but there was nothing. As she was giving up, she heard church bells ringing. She looked across the street and there was a church. She went right over only to find them letting out. But she followed some upstream, where they knelt at an altar. She followed their lead, and felt the pastor's hand on her forehead, and it was exactly the same experience she'd had the day before, and she knew the Lord Jesus Christ was confirming that He was calling her to Himself.
She said she was the least likely candidate to follow the Lord: A Native American raised with stories of missionaries going hand-in-hand with the land-grabbers and a journalist in a culture that's "too smart for God." But she saw that it was only Jesus Christ and what He did on the Cross that could heal her at the deepest places of her pain. She saw that though missionaries to her Nez Perce people may have been used by those with horrible motives, the message the missionaries brought was still Truth. She knew the Lord looked right past the veneer of her success and saw the hurting little girl, trembling in fear that it would all turn off like the utilities of her childhood.
Her story of how that Healing touch has transformed her life and given her peace and joy is told in her autobiography
Falling into Place.
Soon taking applications for the
Rocky Mountain Christian Filmmakers Camp and
Engage Rio.
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