Gods In It...(Pt.3)

In some ways this is the most difficult part for me to write because it tells the story of how I went from being a regular three time a week church attendee to striking out and "accidentally" establishing a ministry of my own. It's difficult because what I've got to say is critical of certain aspects of not just my church at the time but mainstream churches as a whole. Over time what I began to see and hear became very frustrating to me, the message I kept hearing was that we need to be a church outside the four walls but as far as I could see there wasn't any real practical or specific plan as to exactly what that means other than to just "be a good person" or "invite someone to church". Being able to confidently share your faith with others is a weak spot with most Christians. But from my perspective, after all of the ways I had witnessed the Lord's provision in my life through all of the circumstances I'd been through it was very natural for me to tell others how good He was to me! Over time what I was hearing just ceased to minister to me. I wondered if I was being spiritually prideful or if I was just tired of sitting in a pew week after week hearing the call to GO being given but not feeling as though it was something most took seriously. I tried to make suggestions for various outreach activities but they were all ignored or dismissed. There's an old joke about a church that was seeking a new minister, they were particularly impressed by one man and asked him to return and speak to their congregation again, he does but he gives the exact same sermon! The elders met together and asked the young preacher "don't you know any other sermons?" he relied "Sure, and as soon as this congregation start's practicing THIS one I'll preach another!"

One Monday morning in October of 2009 I couldn't get my car started and wasn't able to figure out exactly what was wrong with it and fix it for 26 days. During that time I was unable to attend church and when I finally did get my car fixed I just didn't want to go back. What happened was kind of sad but in another way it was a blessing because it forced me to make a change that I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have otherwise made. The next twist was what I thought was a God ordained partnership with a new friend I had found. Instead it was another necessary nudge that also helped serve the purpose of moving me from being a pew sitter to a well, whatever it is I've become...An evangelist, a counselor, or perhaps just a Christian who's wiling to trust in a God that has brought him through so many things, and in His promises of a plan He has for my life to establish me and not to harm me!

In the beginning of this three part series I used a card game as an illustration to expound upon the ways in which I believe God has shown Himself in my life. Playing cards requires that you pay attention to what's in your hand and that when you have something to "lay down" it's best to go ahead and just do it. To me that's what my blogging has always been about, trying to tell or "lay it down" to others that it's not about what we may go through in this life, it's who you go through it with that gives it meaning or value! Every story I've told here is about how God showed up in the midst of my circumstances and kept me from hitting bottom. I'd also like to say that what I've written here is a very abridged version of many, many ways God interceded on my behalf, far too many for me to even mention! Nobody in my family has ever been hungry or gone without any thing they really needed. Even during the worst of it, when I lost my home, He made sure I had enough money to rent a truck, that I had help moving, and most important a place to move to! God knows me so well, and He knows what I can take and what I can't take.

The following verse in Isaiah really sums it all up for me.

Isaiah 54:17

No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the LORD, and their righteousness is of me, saith the LORD.

Our enemy comes only to kill,steal,and destroy! If the trials and troubles that you have in your life can steal your joy or make you doubt Gods great love for you than his weapons have prospered! It's only through the blood of Christ and the sustaining power of Gods Holy Spirit that we can have victory over life's most difficult challenges. For what was meant for evil against us, only God can turn into good!

One of the most common questions I'm asked by people regarding what I'm doing in my ministry is "How are you funded?" and the answer is that I'm privately funded by Jesus!

Say What?

That's right! He's sustained me through all things and now and has moved me into the position I'm in and even though I only make about 13,000 a year I've been able to financially support my ministry! I live a wonderful life, It seems like I always have plenty of money for life's little extra's, going out to eat occasionally or just buying something I need, it's absolutely true that you can't "out give" God! He's made a 17yr old car that I got as a gift with over 255,000 miles on it last for two years and just last week I was given another car that's the exact same model and color except it's 10yr's newer and in immaculate condition!

He's made sure that my daughter always has nice clothes to wear because He knows that there's no way I would be able to do what I'm doing if I thought she was being made to suffer because of it or if it prevented me from taking care of her. I'm sure that there will be some people who read this and say "Your circumstances were the result of your own bad choices!" Sure I've made some bad choices, who hasn't? But if I had gotten the choices I wanted I would've gone back to work driving a truck, remember? or "I think that there are quite a number of other more practical ways to explain everything that you've attributed to God", and in response to that I say, "You're right! But this is my story and I'm going to tell it how it make's sense to me, I was there, I lived it, and from my perspective it definitely doesn't make sense to me any other way so I guess we'll just have to agree to disagree as to whether "Gods in it" or not!

Well, I've laid all of my cards out on on the table, and slid my entire pile of chips into the pot. And all I want out of the sum of my life's experience is to be able to say that when it came to my faith, "I wasn't just shuckin'! To be able to say that my belief in God not only sustained me but moved me into action, and that I chose to step out in faith and answer what I feel is the call on my life which ALL Christian people have. To live, despite the circumstances of my life in such a way that other's just have to say...

Gods In It!

Matthew 5:16

Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven.

Gods In It...(Pt.2)

It was in May of '08 that they re-possessed my car, a 2003 Subaru Brat, and within a week or so I was given a car to use that had been given to my pastor at the time by one of his congregation. Losing that car was hard, but it was fortunate for me in that by doing so I became eligible to receive food stamps without which my wife, daughter and I might have gone hungry! This was also the last month that I was able to make my mortgage payment of 700.00 on my home and 63 acres. It was along about this time I started thinking something was up and that my circumstances were a conspiracy of sorts. The things that I was able to do successfully were quite limited and for many months consisted of going to the grocery store, church, writing and an occasional venture into West Plains to Wal-mart or Aldi's for necessities. One day I was reading another blog and I came across this bit of wisdom which seemed to describe my situation, it said...

"Sometimes when it seems as though you've lost everything that's the time when God shows you He's really all that you need!"

Those words seemed to bring me comfort because more and more I was understanding their truth and relevance in my life. I spent that summer blissfully unsure of whether I was in a state of grace or one of perdition. Despite the fact that my world was crumbling around me and I was apparently unable to do anything but watch it happen, this was an incredible time of spiritual awakening within me. I'll always remember things like walking down my driveway at sunset talking to the Lord in the cool of the evening, or how even though we had hardly any money we always had gas to go into town to church and we even paid tithes! We still had a roof over our heads and plenty to eat and I wrote some of my most heart felt blogs about my deepening relationship with Christ and my total dependence upon Him. It was my "surrender" that allowed me to have peace knowing that there was a purpose to all that my family and I were going through.

My inability to pay my child support became a huge issue, I was summoned to court to show cause and I tried to explain my predicament to the judge. There was absolutely no way in the world that I could get a job without my having a drivers license which they had suspended! I was asked to return again at a later date which I did although the situation remained unresolved. My third scheduled appearance I was unable to make because I didn't have the 100.00+ it cost's in gas to make the five hour trip so I faxed the prosecutor asking for a continuance. Very soon after that I was told about the possibility of getting a job driving a school bus. I knew that you had to have a background check done to get it and that I probably had a bench warrant out for me so I stopped in at the sheriff's department one afternoon and sure enough I was a wanted man! They seemed pretty shocked by what I was doing but dutifully took me into custody. I spent the next ten days in jail, after two days they sent a car for me to take me back to Cass county, it was a five hour ride in the back of a cop car with my hands tightly cuffed behind my back "Cass-catraz" I believe the inmates called it...

After I got out I didn't get the first job that I was after but within a few weeks a friend at church told me about another school that was looking for a driver and eventually I was hired! One of the things that was so incredible was that I was hired with barely enough time for me to work and receive a paycheck so that I could make a 400.00 support payment that the judge ordered me to make! When I first got this job I was so broke, I remember that I had to ask the superintendent to loan me twenty bucks until I got paid so that I'd have enough gas to get back and forth to work. That was in October of 2008, and for the next eight months nothing really changed except that I added "Go to work" to my routine and had a little more money. Speaking of money, here's something that will put my financial situation in proper perspective...In 2008 I made a total of 2950.00! I actually paid more in child support than I made the whole year, they took my 3900.00 tax return and I paid them over 600.00 to get me out of jail, 400.00 to keep me from going back to court and two or three hundred more in Nov. and Dec.

My home mortgage was almost a year behind by now, and even though my banker was a very kind and patient man who tried to help me avoid losing my home we both knew what was coming. My house had been on the market for over a year and the only real offer I had was for 100,000 which was rejected by our sales person without bringing it to us first for being too low. Ironically our house ended up selling for about 25% less than even that offer when it was all said and done! My house and property was appraised by the bank and came in at 148,000.00 I owed about 72,000 which is what the bank sold it for, I walked away with nothing...

Gods In It...(Pt.1)

Note to readers: This blog is a narrative of an as of yet still unfolding story which is my life. I've included numerous links to blogs I wrote over the last four years on Yahoo 360 before it's demise which serve as the "storyline" or Back story. I've never done a three part piece but due to the complexity and length of the story I felt it was necessary. I do hope that you enjoy it...

Do you see the working of the Holy Spirit in your life on a regular basis? As human's we're entitled to see the events and circumstances of our lives in any way we choose according to our own beliefs. It's the central feature of our free will to acknowledge something or nothing supernatural as playing a part in our lives. Many people believe in only what they can see, in the works of men or in their own abilities, some in luck and coincidence, still others see everything as having an intelligent plan behind it, they believe that everything happens for a reason, that there are no accidents and everything happens "on purpose". I think this synopsis covers most of the bases, personally I believe that because God loves me He is vitally and passionately interested in every detail of my life! I can look back upon the years of my life and see His hand on me, places where He guided me, counseled me, and delivered me from and through so many things. I can also very easily see His love for me through His care and provision in my life. One thing I've noticed about how God seems to work is that when He does something it's never about just one person. Whatever He does always affects many people who are related through circumstances in a positive way.

Gin rummy is a card game where you collect cards that have some sequential relationship to each other and then lay them down for points. The ultimate goal is to match up every card you have into a set of some type leaving you card-less and thus achieving "Gin"!

My card game began back in February of '06 early one morning when I fell on my slightly damp and slippery rough sawed oak front steps and completely tore my rotator cuff. After my surgery I was off of work for about 6mo's. During that summer my wife also unfortunately lost her job as a nurse because of a procedural error she was blamed for which resulted in her nursing license being suspended. In August I went back to work and was digging myself out of the deep hole I was in when I was told my child support would be going from the 400.00 a month plus 150.00 towards arrears that I was regularly paying to a new total of 700.00 a month because of some medical bills I'd never seen but that I was now liable for. Also, it was decided by the government that I and my daughter needed to be automatically enrolled in the health care plan offered by my employer which cost me over 300.00 more a month, she already had insurance but hey, more is better right? In order to try and cope with this financial tsunami I decided that the only thing for me to do was to try and get a better paying job. After completing an over the phone interview, J.B. Hunt told me that I was hired and that I should go to St. Louis, Mo. and report to orientation classes which I did. ( I'm not sure how it has to do with the overall story but I feel as though I need to mention that my father passed away in July of this year which was immediately prior to my trip to St.Louis) Three days into it they told me that they can't hire me because I have a preventable accident on my record. I was involved in an accident while driving an 18 wheeler in '05 but I wasn't cited for it by the investigating DOT officer's. After I quit working for them the company turned the accident in to the driver advocacy council (DAC) as being my fault which essentially black-balled me from getting any driving job. I came home in disgust, and a gentleman whom I had talked to previously about logging my property called me up out of the blue and said he could get right on it! I made a couple thousand dollars that I used to try and start up a home based internet business with a friend of mine which promptly failed. Everything I became involved with failed pretty much right away, nothing I tried worked out! I remember at one point I was desperately trying to sell firewood, it was a Sunday and I had a load sold that was about three quarter's finished. I decided that I wouldn't finish the load because it was Sunday and I wanted to observe the sabbath. That night it rained hard and the next day when I tried to get my truck out it sank down to the axles in mud! That truck sat there for probably 3 months before my stepson brought out his skidder and winched it out.
I was getting discouraged...