Do you ever sit around just thinking about what the Lord has
done in your life? I am close to 70 and I
have been serving the Lord for over thirty years in many different areas of ministry.
I have seen many changes take place in
the church and have, and still do, struggle with some of the changes. The Lord has used me in soul winning and
setting people free from their bondage to sin.
I have gone from being a total worldly freak to being a total
Jesus freak, by God’s grace and the faith He has put within me, for which I am eternally
thankful. There is no way that I can thank
and praise the Lord enough for what He has accomplished in my life over the
years. It is beyond my comprehension when
I think of how many times the Lord could have ‘snuffed out the candle,’ which I
relate to as my life, and sent me straight to Hell, which I deserved, but He
didn’t. I will never understand how God
could love a freak like me. My sins were
so numerous that if lined up side by side they probably would have stretched
for miles and miles. Then to think that
the God of the Universe would even consider a person like me for His son, and
prepare a place for me in His Kingdom, is beyond all reality thinking.
I can understand why it is almost impossible for people to
believe that someone could love them unconditionally like the Word says that
God loves, and that’s why they think they somehow have to do something to earn
or deserve that kind of love. Most
believers know that their works can never contribute to them being saved because
they know what the Word says in Ephesians 2:8-9 as well as other places in the
Bible. Ephesians 2:8-9 says, “For by grace you have been saved through
faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest
anyone should boast.”
But non-believers don’t know the Word; to them that does not
make sense and why should it? I am a believer
and it still baffles me. Through my experiences,
most of the people that claim to have loved me seemed to love only depending on
my performance and not on who I was. If I
have to jump through hoops, always feel like I am walking on eggshells, always
do and say the right things, or dress and look a certain way before someone
loves me, then to me that isn’t love at all, that is called hypocrisy and I don’t
want it. I have experienced that kind of
love most of my life, and so have many others, because love is just a word to
many people and has nothing to do with their actions. That is one of the reasons why I have
struggled with God’s love being un-conditional, it is easy to talk about love but
your actions speak much louder than words.
The saddest part of all this is that some people will never
know what un-conditional love really is because they will never experience it, and
I feel very hurt because of that, I would love everyone to have that experience.
This isn’t just talk to me; I went through
12 to 14 years of heavy depression as a believer because I didn’t think God
could love me like the Word said that He did. I was ministering in church all that time in one
way or another. At times, because of
what I was going through, I would be so nervous I would have to walk out of a class
I was teaching and let my wife or one of my kids take over. There were times I couldn’t eat; all I could
do was cry. I felt like I didn’t belonged
in the church or the world and I didn‘t know what to do. I think all that was happening to me because
Satan was trying to get me back and I had believed his lies.
I thought I was like Cain who killed his brother Abel in the
book of Genesis as it says in Genesis 4:14-16, “Today you are driving me from the land, and I will be hidden from your
presence; I will be a restless wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will
kill me. But the Lord said to him, ‘Not
so; if anyone kills Cain, he will suffer vengeance seven times over.’ Then the
Lord put a mark on Cain so that no one who found him would kill him. So Cain
went out from the Lord’s presence and lived in the land of Nod, east of Eden.”
I thought that I would die without knowing
God’s love ever again.
Twelve to fourteen years is a long time to think that I had
been banished and rejected by God, especially when having a relationship with
God was the most important thing in my life. All this time very few people outside of my
family knew about what was going on. I
pressed into God in those years more than ever, praying and seeking God to
break the chains that were sucking the life out of me, and to deliver me.
Then there was a breakthrough, I met a man in church named
Dan Comfort who was willing to help me, and he did. Dan lived about 35 miles from where I lived at
the time, and he was faithful to drive to my house at least once or twice a week
for 2 years. He prayed for me and shared
with me what the Word said about God’s love.
All the time this was going on, the Lord was showing me the unconditional
love that my wife showed me from the day we were married, and I started
realizing that if my wife could love me that way then God could love me that
way also. My wife has stuck by me
through everything and believe me it hasn’t been easy for her at times. The day she told me she loved me, she meant it.
There was a time when she said that I would
never be sorry if I married her. Well it
has been a little over 35 years and I have never been sorry. When I married her, I married the best woman
for me and I thank God for her.
And while I am typing this, I want to thank everyone that
has helped me, my wife and family through the years and prayed for us, may God
bless you and yours and may you have a super day!!
And for all of you that have hurt me, my wife or family, I want
you to know that I forgive you and may God bless you and yours also!! Have a super day!
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