Wrapped in God’s Grace, A Life Rediscovered

The author was born Barbara Savagian Bras, the oldest of five children in the blue-collar community of South Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Born to an Armenian father and an English-German mother, she was raised in the conservative Lutheran tradition. She explains that her early life in the 1960’s was a protected bubble and as she looks back it was as if she just floated along for the first 20 years. After following her first husband to Hawaii, she graduated from the University of Hawaii at Manoa and returned to a small town in Wisconsin to teach high school English. Although she loved teaching she decided that she needed a new career path, and took a position as a field sales representative for a national company. This was the first step in a thirty year journey. Learning as she went, Barbara’s work included program management, training and development, organization development, consulting and executive leadership. Ultimately she enjoyed leadership roles as Vice President of Human Resources for We Energies and Best Western International, Inc. Along the way she remarried and raised four children. During most of her career Barbara took joy in the fact that she provided encouragement and comfort to those who needed it most. In 2014 she decided that her life required a different direction, one that would allow her to serve God in a more meaningful way. She believes that her new mission is to use her writing to comfort and encourage others by sharing what God has done for her, based on 2 Corinthians 1 verses 3-4. In her words; ＂God has allowed me to learn many lessons through my life’s heartaches. It turns out that when I truly surrender my control and trust in him with all my heart, I discover that what he has in mind for me is always greater than what I could have imagined!＂ Barbara lives with her husband in Scottsdale, Arizona, but she also spends time with family in Wisconsin.