Month: September 2017

“Would you all just leave me alone!” I thought it but did not say it. Standing in the foyer of the church I had just started attending a few weeks before, I felt very uncomfortable. I knew some of the people but most were strangers and at the moment I wanted to keep it that way.

Church was new to me. I had not regularly attended one since I was in high school. In those days, it was a Catholic church. In fact, in those days I had attended a Catholic seminary during my high school years. But that was long ago and many an alcohol and drug stained years had washed under the proverbial bridge since then. Now here I was making small talk with Seventh Day Adventists and trying to appear normal.

The only problem was that in my mind I was sure that my normal was nothing like the normal these folks were used to. All I could think was, “What if I say something that offends one of these holy rollers?” Or “What if they can smell last night’s booze on me. I am sure that will let them know who I truly am.” And that was something I was trying to hide.

The decision had been made that we start attending church without a vote of consent from me. It was the continuing and ever-expanding ‘peace agreement’ I had made with my wife to learn about Sabbath keeping. I had about 6 months before agreed to keep from Friday sun down to Saturday sun down free from alcohol and take part in day long worship. For the most part I was keeping my part of the agreement. Last night I had snuck a few long pulls off the vodka bottle I had hidden in the shed but I not enough to get fall down drunk. I thought that was pretty good.

So, here I was at 10:30 AM on Saturday morning standing surrounded by people I was sure had never been near a person like me and feeling very much out-of-place. I was never happier then when time arrived and I could hide in the peace of the sanctuary. At least there it seemed the prying eyes were elsewhere.

As we sat down, announcements had just started and I was paying little attention. In fact my head was down and taking a non-obvious nap was my true focus. But then I heard a woman’s voice and for some reason I became immediately attentive. She was speaking of a recently started program called 777. This was a call for the worldwide church to pray once at 7:00 AM and once at 7:00 PM, 7 days asking for the latter-day rain of the Holy Spirit. I had no idea why this caught my interest so strongly but the thought came, “You need to be doing this!” It was totally bizarre but would not leave my mind.

The rest of the service and day went by but still the thought persisted. As 7:00 PM approached I was sitting on the couch and my wife was sitting in a chair opposite of me. I was a nervous wreck because I, me the guy who hadn’t prayed in years or maybe ever really, was about to suggest that we pray these 777 prayers together. And as the words came from my mouth I could see tears welling up in her eyes. It seems she had the same impression but was afraid to talk to me about it.
We did pray that night together. It was awkward and embarrassing but the words tumbled out. We also prayed together every morning and night until the day she died, when I sat at her bedside at 7:00 AM on a Sabbath morning my hand on hers begging the Lord to end her misery, ten minutes later He did.

That prayer for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit changed my life. Within a month, I was no longer a stranger at my church. My drinking on Sabbath never happened again and within months I was free from the addiction that had plagued my life for nearly 45 years. Less than two years later I was baptized. And I have had an abiding belief in prayer since that night.

My friends. I don’t offer advice or try to preach in these pages but today I am convicted to share that we need to be praying. It is also my conviction that we need the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the latter-day rain so we can finish work and Jesus will return.

Ellen White in her book The Acts of the Apostles, wrote this: “Near the close of earth’s harvest, a special bestowal of spiritual grace is promised to prepare the church for the coming of the Son of man. This outpouring of the Spirit is likened to the falling of the latter rain; and it is for this added power that Christians are to send their petitions to the Lord of the harvest ‘in the time of the latter rain.’ In response, ‘the Lord shall make bright clouds, and give than showers of rain.’ ‘He will cause to come down… the rain, the former rain, and the latter rain.’ Zechariah 10:1, Joel 2:3. (The Acts of the Apostles, p 55)

Jesus promised this also, “I will pray the Father, and He will give you another Helper, that He may abide with you forever.” (John 14:16) Or “The Helper. The Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all thing that I said to you.” (John 4:26)

We are promised the Holy Spirit to be our Comforter, Helper, Healer. Our Counselor and Advocate. But we need to seek Him in prayer, “Ask, and it will be given to you: seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7-8) In these words Jesus tells us all is possible thru prayer but we need to take that first step. Prayer for the Holy Spirit, alone daily, in our churches together and around the world. If we seek He will be there and we can finish the work with the power only the Spirit can bring.

Almost 7 years from the date of that first prayer, my life has been changed. I am saddened that I rarely get to see those church members who accepted me with love beyond my belief. I now live across the country but am blessed to have a church here in Macon, Georgia who is ready to move forward in prayer on their knees. And blessed to be re-married to a woman of God who wants to, ask, seek, and knock every day of her life and share that with me. Prayer to the Holy Spirit did all that in my life and I want you to share in it. This is my prayer for you this morning, “Heaven is full of light and strength, and we can draw from it if we will. God is waiting to pour his blessings upon us as soon as we draw nigh to him and by living faith grasp His promises. He says that He is more willing to give His Holy Spirit to those that ask Him than earthly parents are to give good gifts to their children. (Historical Sketches, pg. 152, EG White) Grab a hold of His promises today, seek the power of the Holy Spirit. It will change your life and the lives of all those you touch.

Blessings John
9/18/17

“What do you have to say?” he said looking at me with stern, dark eyes. I lifted my head and tried to hold his gaze but soon dropped my head again and just shrugged. I could hear him get up from the table and come closer to me. Sitting on the edge of it so close I could smell his cologne, he whispered, “I know your secret.” With that he shuffled away and I heard the door slam.

Now in my third hour of questioning, I was suspected of being involved in a robbery of a liquor store not far from where I lived. As the detective left I lifted my head enough to see that the room was now empty, but I was sure that I was being watched through the two-way glass to my right. I wondered how much longer could they keep me. There was no evidence.

Earlier in the week I had been drinking at my neighbor’s house and had heard plans being made for the robbery. In fact, I had been asked if I wanted to ‘get a piece of the action’ but turned them down. Now I had a decision to make. Was I going to roll over on my friends or keep my mouth shut and wait it out.

As I was thinking, the detective returned and I could see that he had another cop with him. I knew this guy from a bar I used to hang around. I was pretty sure it was time for good cop/bad cop and I was right. The new guy, who I knew as Ted, drew up a chair next to me and began to talk as if we were best friends, “John, we know you’re not involved and just want whatever information you have…then you will be free to go, just give us a few names.” I stared blankly at him and shook my head. Bad cop was next, “You can and will be charged with withholding information. That brings some hard time with it…. It is your choice.” My choice, I thought. How was I going to choose?

Do we really have choices in this life or are we just pawns in a game, our lives predestined like I have heard even some Christian denominations espouse? I found myself confronted with this question many times in my life before and even after I accepted Jesus as my Savior. Do we really have free will?

So, as I struggled with this at an earlier time in my life, I read all kinds of books but none of them made any sense until I read the Word of God for myself. When I did I saw from the very beginning in the Garden of Eden that man and woman had a choice. They had this perfect world and with hundreds and thousands of good things to choose from and just one bad thing God warns them about, “…You may eat fruit from any tree in the garden. But you must not eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, if you do you will certainly die.” (Genesis 2: 16b -17) Some would and do ask why was there a need for this tree to be there? Why not just have a perfect world where no choices need to be made? The only answer is, that would mean God created not humans but robots. From the beginning, we were given free will and a choice to make.

The Bible is full of people making wrong choices, from Eve choosing to believe Satan’s lie to Peter’s denials. The common thread in all those stories is that even when we do make choices that should doom us God has a plan to save us and they all culminate in Jesus. And in the ultimate choice, faith.

One of the great free will statements in the Bible comes from one of my favorite books, Joshua. It is about the Israelites right after Moses dies. They come into the land of their inheritance, later known as Israel. There they fight for the land and with God’s power conquer many nations. At the end of the book Joshua, who had been their leader after Moses gives them a choice, “And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the LORD, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods of your fathers served in the region beyond the river or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell. But for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. (Joshua 24: 15) Joshua gives them choices and states he has already made his choice, faith, and trust in the one true God. You and I have that same choice today. We can serve the gods of this modern world or choose the one who already died to save us all.

In that room years ago I had a choice to make. At that time, I had no faith, no moral compass to guide me, I did not know Jesus. Questioned, threatened, and cursed at for hours I held on to the idea of honor among thieves. I was released the next morning. Later I learned that when my friends had been caught, that they tried to implicate me and I felt my choices once again had failed me. These days I still choose the wrong way especially when I do not trust those choices to Him who knows the beginning from the end. May we all like Joshua be able to say, “….But for me and my house, we choose to serve the LORD,” That is my prayer today.
Blessings John
9/11/17

The traffic crawled southbound on highway 75. Evacuees from Florida heading back to their devastated homes. We were driving north to Macon for our Tuesday Celebrating Life in Recovery meeting a day after hurricane Irma had ripped thru several states including here in Georgia.

On Monday as I was sitting here writing my blog, we lost power. Throughout the day the storm grew in intensity. At one point, we ventured out to deliver a birthday present to our grandson driving through the area where at least one tree had brought down the power lines which had caused our black out. All along the way was rain and wind-driven damage. But we felt blessed and prayerful because we knew the destruction would not approach what Texas and now Florida was suffering through.

Once we returned home we spent the rest of the day watching the storm as it approached, was right over and finally moved past us. By 4:00 pm things began to calm down. We knew it would be a night without power and as the daylight faded we headed to bed thankful and thoughtful of God’s mercy.
As I was lying in bed in the pitch blackness, I noticed something was missing, something I had never noticed before. The green light of electric razor’s power charger was not glowing. I knew why for sure, but I guess I had never thought of how that soft green light had affected me during the night. As I lay there now I knew that I was missing the comfort of its glow. Strangely it led me to think how often we spend time waiting for a green light.

My disjointed thoughts turned to what Jesus said when He gave us the great commission, “Go into all the world and preach the Good News to the whole creation.” (Mark 16:15) Wow, that seemed to be quite a jump from missing a soft glowing green light to thinking about some of the last words spoken by the Savior. But maybe not.

It is true that I hate red lights and am always jockeying to hit an intersection when I have the green. But when it comes to my “green light” to go into the world and spread the Good News. It seems I am willing to sit at red all day or maybe for an eternity.

There are some days that I do not even speak about the saving power of Jesus with anyone my wife or do a thing to show the love His love either. Yes, three days a week I write this blog trying to share what the Lord has done in my life in hopes that it will touch someone out in cyber space. Praying that it spreads the Good News of Jesus Christ. But is that enough? Is there more?

My favorite Christian author, Ellen White, wrote this,” The Spirit and the bride say, Come.” (Revelation 22: 17) Everyone who hears is to repeat the invitation. Whatever one’s calling in life, his first interest should be to win souls to Christ. He may not be able to speak to congregations, but he can work for individuals. To them he can communicate instructions received from his Lord. Ministry does not consist alone in preaching. Those minister who relieve the sick and suffering, helping the needy, speaking words of comfort to the desponding and those of little faith. Nigh and afar off are souls weighed down by a sense of guilt. It is not hardship, toil, or poverty that degrades humanity. It is guilt, wrongdoing. This brings dissatisfaction. Christ would have His servants minister to sin-sick souls.” (Go Teach All Nations, Chapter 86, page 822)

It is easy enough to think that my ‘go’ is limited to ideas and words. But am I living the Gospel message? Today I have to say no. The problem is that I am not alone. Most of us who claim to be followers of Jesus can talk the talk, but when it comes to walking the walk…. Well, that might be outside our comfort zone. And I know in my heart that is exactly where we should be.

In Mark 15:16 Jesus said to go. The next word is ‘preach’ but it is better translated, proclaim. And what better way to do that then live a life where we are not just sharing what Jesus said, but doing as He did. Being a servant to all…tall order for all of us idling at the red light, but not impossible if we are seeking the Holy Spirit’s leading throughout each day.

We got our power back on yesterday after 30 some hours, thanks to the hard work and dedication of the local power company working around the clock. Our thanks to them here and in all the hurricane affected areas. Last night as I was staring at the greenish glow once again there to comfort me. I felt a little uncomfortable too. It is said the Lord works in mysterious ways. Today I am in awe of that again. While waiting for the green light, He reminded me, green means go and today I know He is asking me to do just that. My prayer is I will in every way. How about you?
Blessings John
9/13/17