Hope for Even Me

HOPE FOR EVEN ME

Loving God Without All The Answers:

Hope for Even Me

John Stewart Hill

1 Corinthians 2:14-16

The person without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from the Spirit of God but considers them foolishness, and cannot understand them because they are discerned only through the Spirit. The person with the Spirit makes judgments about all things, but such a person is not subject to merely human judgments, for, “Who has known the mind of the Lord so as to instruct him?” But we have the mind of Christ. (NIV)

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage retrieval system without the written permission of the author.

The author has used real names for many of the people represented in the book. The names of a few other individuals have been changed to protect their privacy.

Table of Contents

Prologue Part 1 - Life on a Roller Coaster 1 - How It All Started 2 - My Walk with God 3 - The Path of Least Resistance 4 - Marital Bliss 5 - God Speaks 6 - My Haunting Mistake 7 - The Devil's Revenge 8 - Have a Little Faith 9 - Freed from My Captors 10 - Not Exactly a Fairytale Ending 11 - A Second Chance at Marriage 12 - A Punch from Left Field 13 - Ask and You Shall Receive 14 - A Missing Piece 15 - The Cycle Continues 16 - The Final Missing Piece 17 - Try, Try Again 18 - Too Little Too Late 19 - Meeting of the Ex-es 20 - Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places 21 - Striking Gold 22 - The Cycle Ends and Life Begins

Part 2 - A Life with Purpose 23 - Broke, and Broken 24 - My Path to the Desert 25 - I Had a Dream 26 - Living Out the Dream 27 - Moses and Me 28 - Obedience and the Unforeseen Path 29 - Two Questions No One Could Answer 30 - Inspired by God 31 - The Idea that Changed My Life

32 - The Good Contractors List 33 - Bring in the Smart Guys 34 - Wearing Someone Else's Armor 35 - David and Goliath 36 - The Answers to the Tough Questions 37 – The Gospel 38 - Our Real Purpose 39 - Request #1: Be Remembered for Doing Something Good 40 - Request #2: Live Every Day, Not Just Be Alive 41 - Request #3: Touch as Many Lives as Possible 42 – Where Am I Now

Epilogue

Prologue

For as long as I can remember, I felt like God had a purpose for my life. I loved all people and wanted nothing more than to see them happy. I was the kid with a big smile on his face who went the extra mile to help someone in need. It was in my character to do good things for people. However, as I grew older, I felt the pain of being bullied by kids in school. I realized that there were really mean people in the world and soon I was trying to protect myself from those who found it amusing to humiliate me or physically hurt me. Even through the bullying, I loved them, though. I wanted them to love me, and I never felt the need to retaliate.

My desire to feel people’s love and share my love was deep. I spent most of my life trying to fit in, prove my value, live up to everyone’s standards, and do what I thought would make everyone happy. As a result, I eventually found myself hating life. I went through one failure after another and lost sight of who I was as a person and lost sight of the purpose that I thought God might have for me. I imagine that I am not the only person in the world who has lost sight of who they are. If so, I pray that my struggles and realizations will help anyone who is reading this book.

The one consistent thing in my life was knowing there was a God. The God I knew in my heart was always there, even when I wasn’t living my life the way I thought I should be living it. Although I was confident that God existed and that Jesus loved me, I ran from God for many years because I didn’t think I could live up to the person I was “supposed” to be. Raised in a Pentecostal church, I heard hundreds of sermons and teachings about hell, sin, and eternal life. It became obvious to me that I would never live up to the perfection that was required of me to make it to heaven and I gave up. I believed that Jesus was my savior, but based on what I knew from church, I was “backslidden” and was bound for hell if I didn’t change my ways or remove my doubts. I would find myself over the years going back and forth between trying to be a Christian and getting as far away from Christianity as I could possibly get when I realized I was failing.

One of the most difficult places a person can find themselves in life is to want a relationship with God, but to also be confused about who God is and to feel unworthy

5 of His love. Sometimes situations happen that will cause a person to doubt what they have been told about God. They will give up a relationship with God, because of things that has nothing to do with Him. They may have been offended by a person who claims to be a Christian and subsequently chooses to stay away from all Christians. They may realize that no matter how hard they try, they can’t be a “good” Christian. They may have questions about the Bible or Christian beliefs that would make them come to the conclusion that they could never be a Christian. When a person is struggling in this way, it is really difficult for them to ever find their way back to Jesus. Christianity itself keeps them from Christ.

There are many people in the world that easily accept everything they have learned in church and would never allow themselves to question anything. They believe that any question that would bring about a doubt in what they have learned can only come from the devil. They choose to be confident in what they believe and will not be moved. For those people, parts of this book may not leave a warm and fuzzy feeling, but I encourage you to read it to the end and have mercy on those that lack in confidence. Confident Christians are typically “black and white” about the Bible. They will say things like “You either believe the Bible or you don’t”, insinuating that if you don’t believe the entire Bible, then you are not a Christian. This blanket statement is a great stumbling block for people who do not easily believe everything someone tells them. What happens to the person who just can’t understand something? What about the person who decides to give up and just avoids Jesus altogether, because they think they will never believe like the confident Christian? What happens to them?

It is for these people that feel rejected and lost, because of their lack of understanding, that I have the deepest burden. It is for them that I have written this book and my hope is that by the end of this book they will find that they can have a relationship with Jesus and an amazing life in spite of their questions and doubts. My roller coaster life became a life of purpose when I realized that there is hope for even me. I pray that everyone who reads this book will see that they have a purpose, no matter how many times they have failed God or how little or how much they think they know.

Part 1

Life on a Roller Coaster

1 How It All Started

My story began in a small town in Texas, where a scared sixteen-year-old girl found herself pregnant after her first and only indiscretion. She was the daughter of an American soldier and a traditional Japanese woman still entrenched in the old ways of propriety and honor, which made it difficult for the girl to share her dishonorable condition. She knew that if she told her mother about her pregnancy, she would be told to abort the baby.

So began my first moments, being protected from death and loved for the life that I would bring to the world. This young girl hid the life growing inside her for as long as she could, but the day came when she could no longer hide her pregnancy from her mother. The news did not go well with her parents. At first her mother wanted to send her to Japan, where it was still possible to obtain an abortion, but that was not an option for the young girl who valued the life growing inside of her and was willing to fight to see that her baby have a chance to live.

For a time June was estranged from her parents and moved into a halfway house for unwed mothers where she took care of the other girls and did odd jobs to pay for her room and board. Scared and alone, she chose to put her baby up for adoption, believing that the life someone else could provide would be better than what would be in store if she tried to raise her baby.

Meanwhile, John and Bobbie Hill, a couple nearing their 40’s, were thinking they might never be able to have a child. They wanted so much to have a child of their own, but the one pregnancy they had experienced ended in a still birth after carrying the baby full term. The doctors warned them that it was too dangerous for Bobbie to give birth again. The Hills had a friend who was looking at adopting a child and thought it would be a great idea for them as well. Their friend helped them get in touch with an adoption agency. Another couple was in line to get me, but a baby girl was born a couple of weeks sooner and they chose to take the girl.

When the adoption agency heard about the Hills, they said, “We have a baby that is due in a couple of weeks, would you like to meet the mother?” The Hills couldn’t believe what they were hearing and immediately said yes.

The moment June met the couple she knew they were the ones who were meant to raise her baby. She felt the pure and genuine love the couple had and determined that this was the best environment her baby could possibly be raised in. She told the adoption agency that they were the only people she would give her baby to, and the paperwork was put into motion.

One of the worst freezes in Wichita Falls, Texas, history hit that week in February. The excited new parents made their way to collect me and bring me to my new home. We were not the richest but, boy, was there love in that home. My biological mother had accomplished what she set out to do by sacrificing her relationship with her own flesh and blood to see something better for her baby. For this I will always be thankful.

2 My Walk with God

My life as an only child to an older couple was as stable as you can imagine. Although we didn’t have much money, they were not inexperienced with life and showered me with as much love as a child could get. We lived next door to my mother’s parents, so I had two homes where I spent my growing years. My grandfather died when I was three years old and I told my mom that I needed to take care of Granny. I moved in full time with Granny and began “taking care of her.” There was no one on earth who meant more to me than my granny. She spent nearly every waking hour with me. I went with her as she visited people in nursing homes and cared for the elderly in town. I slept in the same bed with her until I was ten years old. She was my life.

My parents did not mind sharing me and we had a wonderful life together. Granny made sure I was in church every time the doors opened. In that little church I fell in love with music and found myself wanting to play the piano, the guitar, the drums, and whatever other musical instrument I could get my hands on. I made up songs in elementary school and sang like the whole world was watching. Most of my early childhood was centered around music and church, and I loved both equally. I remember standing next to my granny in the pew as the preacher's booming voice spoke of hellfire, brimstone, and the love of Jesus. I fell in love with the Spirit that would sometimes flow through that little church and, although I was an only child, I knew that I would never be alone.

I spent hours outside playing by myself and talking to God. I remember feeling the undeniable presence of God and a connection with everything around me. Many times I felt such closeness to the world around me that I would attract that life to me. I remember once feeling so in tune with the energy around me that I held out my finger and a bug flew and landed there. Things like that happened to me often. Those moments of joy, peace, love, and connection to nature were amazing to me.

That, in my opinion, is what God wants for all of us. But as I grew older, my understanding of sin grew. I became more self-aware and soon outgrew my innocence. I began focusing on other things, and those moments of bliss became less and less.

The Pentecostal church is a very strict group within the Christian religion. Their beliefs are unyielding when it comes to sin, the blood of Jesus, repentance, and spiritual gifts. I was a faithful churchgoer and was there nearly every time the doors were open. I sang and played the guitar whenever I could and was very active in the youth group. I knew no other way and believed everything I was told.

One message I heard over and over was “if you sin, you will go to hell." There was forgiveness if you repent, but if you didn’t repent, hell would be waiting for you. Your life after death would be based on what you did and what you believed. If you believed the right things, you would go to heaven where you got to be with God and would experience more joy and peace than you had ever felt on earth. If you didn’t live right, then you would spend eternity in hell with the devil; he and his demons would torture your soul for eternity. There would be no escape from horrible pain, thirst, and emptiness. All I knew was that I certainly did not want to go to that place. So, instead of focusing on what my spirit already knew about God, I now focused on not going to hell and doing the “right” things.

I had moments where thoughts of heaven and hell would consume my mind, as well as many questions that no one seemed able to answer. One day, diving off the diving board at our local pool, I slipped and said a curse word as I entered the water. Nobody heard me, but I knew what I had said. I wondered, "what if I had drowned before I had the chance to ask for forgiveness?" Would I have gone to hell? This thought terrified me, and I tried to be perfect for many years after that incident.

I began examining every move I made, every thought that entered my mind, and every word that left my lips. It became sheer misery once I reached puberty and found myself interested in girls. The church taught that if you looked at someone with lust in your heart, it was equal to the sin of adultery, and sins like that would send me to hell. What was I supposed to do? It didn’t take a lot of prompting to create lust in my heart at that age!

Spending all day focused on my sinful thoughts and repenting became torturous. The more I focused on my lust problem, the more of a lust problem I had. The moment I had

11 my first physical relationship with a girl, I just gave up. There was no way I was going to be able to overcome sin, so there was no way I would ever end up in heaven.

3 The Path of Least Resistance

When I was sixteen, my granny developed cancer and passed away. On Independence Day, July 4, 1984, I lost the woman who had been the most important person in my life. I was devastated and felt lost without my granny to take care of. I left her house and moved back in with my parents. A void was created that day that I would spend my life seeking to fill. I found myself falling away from God and just gave up on living a holy life.

I spent the next several years participating in every fleshly pleasure possible and having what I thought was fun. The intense energy that flowed between two teenagers “in love” was better than anything I was now feeling in church, the few times I chose to attend a service. I imagine those feelings of extreme chemistry are difficult for anyone to overcome, and I was, as the song says, “hooked on a feeling." In the back of my mind, I always felt guilty for giving in to my desires. However, if I couldn’t live a perfect life free from sin, this had to be a close second.

Giving into this sin of physical intimacy and connection was a much better feeling than the struggle to try and block all that pent-up testosterone. Not spending countless hours examining my thoughts and actions was much more appealing than sitting in church and hearing another message that added to my guilt, so I got as far away from church as I could. I began running from God and even picked up the awful habit of smoking. What did it matter? There was no way I would avoid hell, anyway, with all the sin in my life.

I fell in love with every girl I dated because that connection felt so good. It felt spiritual to me. The energy was incredible, and it overpowered my heart. This was the love that I had wanted so much to feel. This was equal to or more amazing than those moments I had had as a child. This seemed real. At the time I had no idea it was chemical, an animalistic instinct to continue the survival of the species. All I knew was that it was the best feeling on earth and I was in love. How could it be bad to be in love with someone?

I had many relationships where I thought I was in love and soon found out that it could fade away as quickly as it began. All I wanted was a forever love with whom I could spend the rest of my life. I couldn’t understand why I could never find a girl who loved me the way I loved them. I allowed girls to break my heart so many times. It seemed I really wasn’t interested in the ones who would have been the best for me. Those who were most interested in me and seemed to be head over heels in love with me were just not what I wanted. I was always attracted to women who had problems I felt I could help solve. I would be their knight in shining armor if I could love them through an addiction or depression, or could help them get back on their feet. I guess I was seeking another woman whom I could “take care of” in their sadness.

When I was eighteen I met a girl named Mara who seemed to be the saddest person I had ever met, but we had incredible physical chemistry. She also had an ex-boyfriend, Rob, whom she couldn’t get over and would constantly leave me so she could be with him. She hurt me repeatedly, but I didn’t give up this time. I was going to win her over, even though she didn’t seem to love me like I loved her.

One night after getting dumped so she could visit Rob, I made what seemed like a rash decision. I went to the movies by myself. The movie, "Top Gun," gave me a great idea. If I couldn’t have the woman I loved, then I was leaving this one-horse town to see the world. The next day I went to the air force recruiting office to talk to someone. Their office was closed for renovations, but as I walked back to my car, a stocky navy petty officer came out of his office and hollered, “Come here, son." He said the air force people were “zipper heads” and that the navy was the way to go.

After he gave me the sales pitch, I signed on the dotted line. I went to the military processing station in Dallas and scored high enough on my test to get a job in naval intelligence as a cryptologic technician. I was scheduled to leave for boot camp in four months. My parents were really proud of me, and I was excited about going. However, I was really scared to be by myself, and I still felt confident I would eventually talk Mara into being with me.

One day, after the ex-boyfriend who was stringing her along hurt her one more time, Mara told me that she really did love me and wanted to be with me. I thought, now that I have joined the navy, you decide to tell me that you want to be with me?

I started asking her to marry me. I asked her every day, and every day she said no. She said she didn’t want to leave her family and that if I were to go overseas, she would not be with me. I talked about it with my recruiter and he assured me that I would more than likely get shore duty in the United States and would be able to drive home as much as I wanted.

I finally made it through the four-month waiting period and shipped off to boot camp. I wrote at least one letter a day to the girl of my dreams, asking her to marry me in every one. I was sure that she would eventually say yes. Near the end of boot camp, a career counselor came to visit to talk about our orders and what it was like in the “real” navy. I told him that I was going to be a cryptologic technician and that my recruiter had assured me I would get orders to shore duty in the United States. He laughed at me. “Son, cryptologic technicians only go overseas or are on a ship!”

The recruiter had duped me. This life-altering news knocked the air out of me. I didn't have a chance with Mara now that my dream of being close to home was thwarted. I walked behind my bunk and started crying. My life was over, because I knew that the love of my life would never marry me now. The next letter I wrote her was full of sadness and fear, but I had to tell her the truth about what the counselor had said. To my amazement, she said she would marry me.

Shortly after I got out of boot camp and went to navy school in Pensacola, Florida, I flew home for the weekend and got married. I was the happiest man in the world and I knew that we would live happily ever after. I would take away all of her sadness and prove to be the best husband any woman had ever had.

4 Marital Bliss

Just as the career counselor had said, the only orders offered to me were for overseas and for ship duty. I had excelled in navy school and graduated first in my class, so I was able to choose the orders. I chose Guam, because it was for only two years. I thought I might have a chance to go back to the States after that. Mara was not excited about it, but she said that everything would be okay. So we packed up and left for Guam.

Although we did have a few good moments, the majority of the time she was miserable and didn't mind telling me it was all my fault. She began saying how much she hated me and threatened me with divorce on a regular basis. I couldn’t rationalize that we were just kids and I had taken her away from her family, which was the source of her pain. I felt like a big loser as there seemed to be nothing I could do to make her happy. The feeling of ecstasy I had felt was gone. The feeling of connection I had felt was also gone. After seeing the sadness that I seemed to cause Mara and hearing her threats of divorce, I became pretty numb and sad myself.

We finally made it through Guam and I chose my next duty station. Of course, there were no stateside billets, so I chose a duty station in Hawaii. Three years in Hawaii. I thought, who wouldn’t want to get to live in Hawaii? There was only one person I could think of, and she had no problem telling me how much she hated me for not getting something close to home. I felt tremendous guilt and realized I was never going to make her happy.

We flew home from our island prison on Guam and had forty-five days to spend with our families before I started my next school in San Angelo, Texas. Goodbye, Guam, and good riddance! I thought that she would be happy that I chose a school that would allow her to spend four months at home with her family before we left for Hawaii. However, while we were home on leave she began threatening me again with divorce. I had been home long enough to see my friends from school having a great time being single and partying. So this time I called her bluff and said, “I will take you up on that divorce and you can stay with your mama."

I arrived at San Angelo feeling pretty depressed about splitting up with my wife and failing as a husband. My new roommate was plugged into the social scene in San Angelo and decided to cheer me up. He talked me into going to a bar with him and it didn’t take many invitations before I found my new love…the bar!

I spent the next four months having one party after the other. I found that it was extremely easy to feel those chemical feelings with many girls and not have that pesky need for a relationship. They were after the same things I was after for this short moment in time. We were all going to be leaving and would never see each other again, so why not have fun!

Just as I was ending my stay at the navy school and taking my orders to Hawaii, Mara came to visit so that we could figure out how to complete the divorce and split our belongings. The moment we saw each other, we felt all the feelings we had had in the beginning and decided to stay married. I was very happy to be back with her. The party life was tiring and empty, and I still believed we had a chance at a happy marriage. We packed up our things and boarded the plane to Hawaii. It was on the plane that she started having second thoughts, but the plane didn't turn around.

We were forced to stay in a hotel the first couple of months while we waited for housing. It didn’t take long before we were right back where we were before, and I doubted if we were going to make it again. The stress of the move caused her to be late on her monthly cycle, or at least that was what we thought. It turned out that the night we got back together in San Angelo, we had created something that would change our lives forever. In the midst of turmoil, we had created a new life and things would never be the same. Once I saw the pregnancy test it was all over. I was going to be a father! All of a sudden, nothing else mattered. We began getting along really well, because there was something other than her misery to focus on, and we were going to be parents.

Her parents flew down for the big day and I was able to be in the room when my daughter Ashley was born. It was the most amazing thing I had ever seen. I was overwhelmed when I saw her and it took my breath away. She was everything to me and I was going to be the best daddy in the world. The next three years brought me more joy than I had ever felt. I loved my family and even though my marriage still had

17 its ups and downs, I was going to make it work. We made it through the three years in Hawaii, and I thought we were going to make it forever.

I promised Mara that I would find a way to take a duty station in the States so she could drive home whenever she wanted, so we took orders to Norfolk, Virginia, where I would be on LHD-3 (USS Kearsarge) as a “plank owner." I was considered a plank owner because the ship was still being built and I would be one of the first crew members to sail on the ship. The navy gave me a few weeks in Norfolk to help set up my family. We found a cute townhome in Virginia Beach, just a twenty-minute drive to the shipyard in Norfolk, the port where my ship would eventually be docked. I then returned to Pasacagoula, Mississippi, where the ship was being built, while Mara finished preparing our new home.

I made many friends while I was on the ship and had a great time hanging out with them. We were all away from our wives and had fun partying while we waited for the ship to be finished. Even though things were going well with Mara, it didn't take long to fall into the party life again with a whole crew of sailors hitting the bars and having fun.

One night on a drunken binge I met a waitress at one of the bars I frequented with my friends. One thing led to another, and I ended up cheating on my wife with a woman named Lisa. It was days before we left the shipyard, and because it was one isolated incident and the sailor’s code is “what happens at sea, stays at sea,” I pushed the event out of my mind and tried my best to forget it. Though I felt tremendous guilt, I was never going to speak of what happened and let it destroy my family.

Hiding the truth was a horrible decision, but it wasn't worth losing my wife and child by coming clean. Only my close friends knew about it, so it was a secret I would hide forever. We sailed away from the shipyard in Pascagoula a few weeks later and headed for my new home in Virginia Beach. I held great hope for a new life with my Mara and Ashley.

5 God Speaks

With Pascagoula behind me and my family reunited, everything seemed back to normal until, on April 3, 1994, something remarkable happened. I was sitting on the front porch of our new townhome, smoking a cigarette as I often did, when out of nowhere a voice said, “Are you tired of running yet?”

Although it wasn’t audible, I knew it was God speaking to me. I had not been in church for nearly ten years and had lost all desire to go back, so it was not something that was on my mind. But I was tired of the life I'd been leading. Without hesitation, I replied, “If you can change me, I will follow you anywhere.”

As you can probably imagine, being every bit a sailor, I had a number of habits I needed to clean up, one of which was a problem with my mouth. I cussed like a sailor! My cussing was second nature at this point, and I didn’t even realize when I did it. The next day I was in conversation with a fellow sailor and as I was about to say a curse word, something literally grabbed my tongue. I felt it as sure as if a human being had reached out and grabbed hold of it. It shocked me, but I tried to say the curse word again. Again something grabbed my tongue and the word came out “blah."

Something changed in me at that moment. I even put down the cigarettes and felt clean and free for the first time since I was a child. It dawned on me that God was doing His part, and that my language was something that needed to change. I knew that God really had spoken to me, that He did love me and wasn’t a judge in heaven waiting to smite me for my sins. I realized that I could have a relationship with Him, and that He was real.

After that day, I couldn’t get enough of God. I spent every free moment trying to learn about God and praying. The joy and peace I found were greater than anything I had ever felt in my life. My life was changed and I was never going to have another problem. My friends didn’t know what to do with me. I stopped drinking and cussing, and walked around with a big smile on my face. Instead of partying with them, I went off by myself to pray and read the Bible. Before long I was being attacked, made fun of,

19 or ignored by those who didn’t understand what had happened to me. Soon I realized that I now had no friends.

I desperately wanted someone with whom I could share my newfound love, but none of my friends wanted anything to do with it. I found the one guy in our division who was a “church” guy. He was a member of the United Pentecostal Church, which is even more extreme in following the letter of the law than the Pentecostal church I grew up in. They would not allow their women to wear make-up or any outward adornment, and they said that you would go to hell if you were not baptized with the right words. It wasn’t good enough to be baptized “in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost." If you weren’t baptized in “the name of Jesus,” you were not saved and you were going to hell. It didn’t take long before his views were too much for me to stand. I chose to stop listening to him, preferring to be alone.

I scheduled a time every day to meet God and spend time in prayer. There was a deserted part of the ship with extra sleeping areas reserved for the marines who would be deployed when we went to sea. Nobody ever went to those areas, so it was a safe place to be alone with God and pray out loud. I prayed that God would send me friends who shared my love for Him and were not focused on hellfire and brimstone.

A week later I met a man named Marcus who asked if I wanted to get together with some of his friends. They seemed to have a real passion for God and would meet every day to pray as a group. I was not shocked to find that they met in the very room where I spent my time alone with God. The ship had many empty spaces, and these men happened to pick the compartment where I spent every day praying for friends.

We began meeting together daily and had some awesome prayer times. We would share what God put on our hearts or biblical teachings that spoke to us. One day I started talking about a passage I had read and found myself preaching. I was the only white guy in the group, so they all sat there with their jaws open as I shared the message with the passion and vocal prowess they were used to hearing in church. They began calling me John the Baptist because of my passion for teaching what I was learning. I was at an all-time high in my spiritual life. I had found new friends who did not find me offensive, but who saw me as something great.

I also met a man named Cobo, who like me, was somewhat of a misfit. He didn't fit in with the party crowd and seemed to have a different mission in life than to be a sailor. I discovered that he played guitar, so we became friends and started writing music together. He had been in the music scene when he was young and had a dream of someday returning to music and being a star. I was shocked and excited to find that he loved the way I wrote. I had received accolades from the people at church when I was young, but I always thought they were just being nice. Here was someone who knew music who said I had talent. I wrote several songs while I was on the USS Kearsarge, and Cobo, my prayer group, and my relationship with the Lord made the time on that ship one of my fondest memories.

Unfortunately, the majority of my old friends became more and more distant. Jeff, one of my best friends while I was living the party life, became angry at me and began to bully me. I never preached to him or tried to convince him to believe what I did, yet he looked at me with sheer disgust. Seeing me clean up my act and become someone totally different did not sit well with him. He knew the old me and refused to believe that a man could change as much as I had. Jeff made it his personal mission to make me as miserable as possible. He verbally and physically picked on me, much like the bullies at school, saying mean things and “accidentally” bumping into me to cause me to trip.

One day I got fed up and reacted by telling him to grow up. He slapped me in the face while everyone else watched. I felt that I was a big joke to them, but nothing was going to get me down. I had found my place in the world and no one would take away my joy.

6 My Haunting Mistake

One day as I was driving home from the shipyard, God spoke to me again. I know that sounds strange, but there is no other way to explain it. The impression was so clear to me that it seemed like a voice.

“She knows.”

“She knows?”

Then it dawned on me that I was being warned that my wife had found out about my cheating on her while I was in Pascagoula.

This strange message came from so far out of the blue that I took it very seriously. All the way home I was trying to think of what I would say.

Sure enough, the moment I walked in the door, Mara said, “Those guys would do anything to hurt you or make you look bad. Someone called and said that you cheated on me in Pascagoula and to ask you about Lisa."

I had my chance to deny it, but because of the changes I had experienced, she knew I wouldn’t lie, so I told her the truth. I begged for her forgiveness and to my surprise she said, “You are a different person than you were when that happened and I forgive you.”

Well, you can imagine how elated I was to be rid of the secret and forgiven for my mistake. I felt on top of the world and indestructible.

Now that the secret was out and I was free, I had to go back to the ship knowing that someone had tried to ruin me. I was getting out of the car and about to walk up to the ship when it dawned on me that I didn’t have a clue what I was going to do.

“What am I supposed to do?” I asked God, and again He spoke to me.

“Acts 18:9," He said.

I pulled out my pocket Bible and went straight to the scripture, which read, “Be not afraid, but speak, and hold not thou peace."

I got so excited that I thought I would jump out of my skin. I was about to enter the building with enthusiasm until I realized that I didn’t know what I was going to say. So I stopped in my tracks and asked God, “What am I supposed to say?”

God responded with another scripture! “Luke 12:12.”

Again I pulled out my Bible and was amazed to read, “For the Holy Spirit will teach you at that time what you should say." It was undeniable that I was hearing the voice of God. There was no way I could have pulled those two scriptures off the top of my head to answer the questions I had just asked.

I made my way to our morning muster and asked the leading petty officer if I could have a moment to speak to the group before he released us to our duties. He hesitated at first and asked what this was about, but then he said, “Never mind, yes, you can say what you need to say."

After the muster was over, he let me go up front to speak. I felt the presence of God immediately. “First of all, I am not saying this to get anyone in trouble, and I don’t want anyone to even try to find out who did it. I also want to say thank you, because I am now released from some major guilt I was feeling. Someone called my wife yesterday and told her about me cheating on her in Pascagoula. She has chosen to forgive me, so I would appreciate it if there is anything else that one of you sees as a problem that you would come directly to me and leave my family out of it.”

For the first time I saw a shift in the people who had watched as I was being bullied and made fun of. Before this event, most were content to stay out of it and ignore what was happening, but the limit had been reached and these silent watchers soon became angry and began voicing their disapproval of how I was being treated and especially of breaking the sailor's code.

People were yelling, "Who did this? That's not right! What has John ever done to anyone? Somebody needs to fess up now!"

The petty officer threw his clipboard across the room, and I yelled, “Stop! I am finished with all of this. I forgive whoever did it, and I am thankful that I am free, so please let it go and move on. I don't care who did it, it's over now, just please come to me first if you have a problem and leave my family out of it.” I walked away feeling extremely powerful. I was free!

Later, as I was walking back to my car to go home for the day, I felt almost super human. I felt like I could take on anyone and anything that got in my path so, in my pride, I yelled out, “What can you do to me now, devil?!” It was the single biggest mistake I have ever made in my life.

I immediately felt God pull His hand away. I had gotten cocky and thought I had the power to take on the devil. The downward spiral that followed would humble the most prideful of people. I thought I had the power to overcome temptation. I felt that God must have thought I was something special to speak to me, deliver me from all my sins, and free me from those who persecuted me. The moment I got prideful and arrogant with the devil, I could almost feel God drop His head and say, “Well, I can’t help you with this one.”

I shook off the feeling that God was pulling away from me and kept on doing the things I had been doing. I went to church, prayed and read the Bible, and continued participating in the choir as my service to God. Mara was finally going to church with me, and it seemed that things were going just fine, so I thought that I must have avoided the devil getting me back for challenging him.

Then one day a woman joined the choir who caught my eye. I felt drawn to her and thought she was beautiful. Sheila had shiny straight hair that reached the small of her back, sweet blue eyes, a smile that was just as sweet, and a petite frame that seemed fragile but strong at the same time.

Right away I recognized that I was thinking things I shouldn’t be thinking. This woman didn’t have a clue that I existed, and I never let on even a little bit that I found her attractive. I started having dreams about her. In one of the dreams I was lying next to her, face-to-face, and she told me she loved me. I figured it was the devil messing with my mind, so I kept my distance and never spoke to her. She would never look at me and the closest we got to talking was one day at church when we said hi as my wife and I passed her.

At the time I had a friend who went to church with us and thought that Sheila was very attractive. He asked me to ask her what she thought of him and if she would be willing to go out with him. I told him that I had never even spoken to her myself and she would think I was crazy for coming up out of the blue to see what she thought about him. He coaxed me further and I agreed to ask her the next time I saw her at choir practice.

Inside it was killing me, because I was having feelings that I had not felt in a long time and thought I was falling in love with Sheila myself. Remember, I had not said more than hi to her, so there was no logical reason for me to have these feelings. The dreams had turned to day dreams, which went far beyond feelings. It made me very aware that I was in a battle for my soul.

I prayed diligently for God to rid me of these feelings and I tried with all my inner strength to fight them myself. I had been praying for my wife to get fired up for God, and I prayed often that I wanted her to be willing to “follow me to Africa if that was where God sent me." I truly wanted to have a flourishing marriage, but we were in two different places in our spiritual walk, and it would take a miracle to see a change of that magnitude.

The one thing I had going for me regarding Sheila was that she had never shown any interest in me and I had not spoken to her. All I had to do was avoid showing any interest in her and I would be in the clear. I decided I would try to set her up with my friend, which would throw her off any idea that I was interested in her. After all, I was a married man, so it was obvious that I was already taken, and we were both in church. I was sure that she would never suspect I had feelings for her.

7 The Devil’s Revenge

I went to choir practice and waited until the end to gather the courage to approach Sheila. As we were all about to leave, I walked up to her and said, “Hi, I know this sounds weird because I have never even spoken to you, but my friend wants to know if you might go out with him.”

She laughed. "Walk me out to my car. I need to talk to you about something."

I thought, “What the heck does she need to talk to me about? I guess she wants to explain that she is with someone else or tell me why she isn’t interested in my friend.”

We got out to her car and stood in the parking lot. I was doing a good job of hiding the fact that I wanted to grab and kiss her and tell her my feelings.

What happened next literally took my breath away. “John," she said. "I can’t go out with your friend, because I am in love with someone else.”

I felt a flood of mixed emotions. “Oh, I am sure my friend will get over it. It was worth a shot.”

“John, I am in love with you.”

I thought for a minute that I had swallowed my tongue. I pushed out the words, “I'm a married man and there is no way."

Sheila said that she had been having dreams about me and that she didn’t understand it all, but she had very deep feelings for me and knew that God wanted us to be together.

I told her that God would not want us to be together because I was married, and her feelings had to have come from the devil.

She went on, “I don’t know how it can happen, I just know that it is meant to be and that I love you so deeply that I would follow you to Africa if that is where God sends you!”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. I had thought I was crazy for falling for someone I had never even spoken to, and then I heard that she was in love with me, having dreams about me like I was having, and saying the exact words I prayed in my prayers.

I made the mistake of telling her that I was having the same feelings but had been suppressing them because I knew they couldn't be coming from God. Part of me wanted to believe that Sheila was the one God had made for me, but I was already married, and I knew that it would not be what God wanted for me. So I told her that I couldn’t talk to her anymore and that the desire we were feeling toward one another was from the devil. She said that she understood, but she would never stop loving me and would wait until I was free to be with her.

After that, I found myself constantly daydreaming about being with her, and it made me ache inside that I couldn’t be with her. Mara had all but quit being intimate with me, and it seemed that she would never come around to my Christian way of life, even though she was now going to church with me. I thought, “Mara will never dedicate herself to want this way of life 100%," not realizing that I was being judgmental and proud, which also made me ignorant. I became very bewildered about the feelings that had arisen in me regarding Sheila and walked around in a cloud of confusion and turmoil.

Eventually Sheila befriended Mara, and one night Mara invited her over. I didn’t know what to do. It was an obvious attempt to get close to me, and my feelings for her had not subsided. I sat in awkward silence as I watched Sheila and Mara talk and laugh and make plans to babysit for each other so that Mara and I could have a night out. I was very uncomfortable and became very nervous, but I couldn't let them see what I was feeling.

I decided to tell Mara what was going on after Sheila left the house because I thought that was the test I needed to overcome. If I told her about the feelings and temptations I was having, it would all go away and we could move on.

Well, it didn’t work out like that. Instead of focusing on the fact that I had told Sheila that I was married and was trying to get away from her, Mara became extremely upset and called her mother to come and get her. I thought I had done everything right. I hadn’t succumbed to temptation, and I had come clean. I thought, “What the hell?”

Mara’s mom arrived two days later. I stood in the parking lot and watched as Mara and Ashley were driven away. I saw my little girl looking out the window at me as they pulled away, and it crushed me. I became so angry that I hunted Sheila down at her work and told her what she had done. She said in a sweet voice that she was so sorry that all that had happened and that she wanted to make up for it and talk about it later when she wasn’t at work.

Like a fool, I agreed to meet her at her apartment to talk. Deep inside I guess I knew we would have a moment of weakness, but I was angry and confused and still felt deeply in love with her. My confusion was overwhelming, because I felt so much pain and yet still wanted it to be true that I could have someone who loved me as much as this woman seemed to love me.

Later that night I met Sheila at her apartment. She was dressed in sweats and cooking lasagna. In my daydreams I would imagine her in sweats, curling up in my lap and looking into my eyes with love and sheer adoration. I sat in the living room thinking how much I wanted to be with her while at the same time thinking how I needed to get out of there as fast as I could. Sheila reached a stopping point in her cooking, walked straight into the room where I sat, and curled up in my lap just as I had envisioned.

The energy that was flowing between us was beyond anything I had felt before. We kissed a long, deep kiss, and finally I pushed her away. I was battling, but it was a losing battle. We stopped and ate and talked about what had happened, but she held fast to her belief that we were meant to be together. She had a young son, so I told myself that with her son awake, nothing physical would happen.

Finally it was late enough for her to put him to bed. While she was in his room trying to get him to sleep, my mind was telling me to get the heck out of Dodge. However, my emotions were telling me to stay. After a short while she returned to the living room in

28 a skimpy nightgown and began to undress me. I fought her for what seemed like a lifetime, putting my hand between her and me to keep from going all the way, but the temptation was too great and we had gone too far to return. I finally gave way to temptation.

In that moment I heard the most evil laugh coming from her, and I felt her nails dig in as they peeled the skin from my back. It was a deep laugh that sounded like a host of demons all laughing at once, which had to be the single scariest moment of my life. It was like something out of "The Exorcist."

I broke loose, threw on my clothes, and got out of there as fast as possible. My head was spinning. I drove around and cried for an hour, praying that God would kill me. When I finally got home, I looked at my back in the mirror and saw claw marks from top to bottom. The challenge that I made to the devil, “What can you do to me now?” had been brought to completion. I had challenged the devil, and the devil won.

After the devil got his revenge, I spoke to Sheila only once, to see if what happened was real. She was very cold and emotionless about our brief affair, and neither of us seemed to have any interest in seeing each other again. All those feelings we had had toward each other had disappeared. It was as if we had been under a spell, and now we were awake and disgusted with the whole thing and had no interest in each other.

I know that it was my challenge to the devil that made it all happen. It destroyed my family, and now I was left alone in Virginia with my family back in Texas. Many years later I called the church we had attended and asked about the choir girl. A friend of mine told me that she had been diagnosed with stage four cancer and had gone back to Kansas to spend her last days with her family. I thought to myself that I should have suffered the same fate.

I hope to never be so proud as to personally challenge Satan again. If I have learned anything, it is that I am capable of doing unimaginable things when I am left to my own devices and that I have to rely completely on the grace of God to overcome my weaknesses. It is by His power and strength alone that anything truly good has ever come to me.

8 Have a Little Faith

After my demon-possessed encounter, I told Mara what happened and explained that I wouldn’t blame her if she hated me the rest of her life, but I wanted her forgiveness, even if we never got back together again. We had found out right before she left that she was pregnant for the second time. I was very excited that I was going to be a daddy again, but was unsure about what my relationship with my kids would be like if we weren't going to be together. Amazingly she chose to forgive me yet again. I had no idea what the future held for us now, or how I would reunite with my family, but I knew I had brought this all on myself.

With my wife and daughter in Texas, I was about to go on the ship's first six-month cruise. I prayed day and night, trying to figure out a way to get to Texas. One day I found a clause in a regulation that said I could be transferred from a pre-commissioned ship after two years. I followed up on that and began making contacts with officials in Washington, D.C., who were in charge of orders. I found a program where military members worked at a Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS) to process the new recruits coming into the military.

I had been processed through an MEPS in Dallas, where my family was now living, and I knew in my heart that I was going to Texas. I believed it with every part of my being, but I was being told that my job was considered a “critical rating.” This meant that we didn’t have enough people who knew how to do what I did, and that the higher-ups in Washington would never let me work at a processing station.

I could only envision myself in Texas with my family, nowhere else, so I chose not to believe what everyone was telling me. I kept applying for the program, and every week when orders were being processed, I would call to see if there was a position available at Dallas MEPS. The lady who dispersed orders explained to me that the positions were highly sought after and that I would practically have to be waiting at the billeting station in Washington, D.C., when the orders came off the press if I wanted the job.

One week I made the drive to Washington, D.C., on the chance that this would be the week that a Dallas MEPS position opened up. As amazing as everything else that had happened, I was there when the orders came across the printer. No one could believe it. I was given the orders to go to Dallas MEPS, a year earlier than I was supposed to leave the ship, in a critical rating that never had opportunities like that. It was a miracle.

Everyone was talking about it in my division. I had avoided going on the ship's first six- month cruise, and it royally upset my superiors. One day our senior chief came into the work space, much more jovial than usual, and said, “Hill, you are going on the cruise!”

“No, sir, I have orders to report to Dallas MEPS before the cruise begins,” I told him.

“I know," he said, "and I just got the news that all orders have been suspended until after the six-month cruise, so you will be staying with us!”

Sure enough, he had managed to get my orders suspended, and I was going on the cruise. Well, I still felt in my spirit that I was going to Texas, so I told him, “I don’t know how it is going to happen, but I am still going to be in Texas before the six-month cruise ever starts.”

He laughed at me. “Good luck." He walked away laughing, and I walked away confused.

Even after all that had happened, with my infidelity and obvious failure, my relationship with God continued to grow. It seemed that He was able to rebuild me from the rubble. I had decided to read all the way through the Bible in order to get back my passion for seeking God. Being with my family was all I cared about, and I gave it to Him to take care of. Whatever happened, it would be the right thing. I felt He would make a way.

9 Freed from My Captors

One night I was sleeping in my bunk when I heard a faint voice say "Gilgal." The voice grew louder and louder. This time it was not just an impression, as when God spoke to me that day on my front steps. It was as audible as a human being speaking to me. I seemed to be half asleep and half awake. The voice was saying “Gilgal” over and over.

It finally annoyed me enough that I said out loud, “What is Gilgal?”

The voice said, “It’s a place.”

“A place? What kind of place?”

“A place on the eastern border of Jericho.”

I was perplexed because it didn’t make a lick of sense to me. I went back to sleep and thought I would deal with it when I woke up. The next day I went around asking my friends if they had ever heard the word “Gilgal,” and nobody had ever heard of it. That night as I read my daily Bible reading, I came across Joshua 4:19. “On the tenth day of the first month the people went up from the Jordan and camped at Gilgal on the eastern border of Jericho." The verse was several chapters ahead of where I had ever read, so I knew I had not seen the verse before.

What did all this mean? I searched the library for study material that might give me a clue about Gilgal. What I learned was that it was the first place the Israelites encamped in the Promised Land. They had wandered in the desert for forty years after escaping from Egypt and had finally reached the place that God had promised them. I found a study Bible that gave the definition of the word Gilgal as “a rolling away.” It was the place where God first rolled away the reproach of Egypt or, in other words, freed the Israelites from their captors. I understood that I was about to be freed from my captors, and I thought to myself, “What the heck does that mean?”

The next couple of days didn’t seem any different. But on the third day after hearing the voice, I was reminded by the clinic that I needed to report to an orthopedic appointment I had scheduled several months earlier because of a twisted back. However, I had fully recovered and didn’t think I needed to go. A friend reminded me that orthopedic appointments were hard to get and said the clinic might offer me advice that would keep me from hurting my back again, so I kept the appointment.

When the doctor came in, he asked me to bend down and touch my toes and to twist from side to side. Then he asked if I had ever had other problems with my back. I told him that every once in a while there would be pain when I was running up and down the ladders during Rescue and Assistance drills. I was on the R & A Team and occasionally had to carry fire hoses up and down ladders.

He wrote something on his clipboard. “Do you have anyone on the ship who can bring you your stuff?”

I was confused. “What do you mean?”

“You are not allowed back on the ship, and you need someone you trust to bring your things out to you.”

I started to question him, but instead said, “Yes, sir.”

I wasn't able to see the reaction of the crew members who had laughed at me, nor did I speak to that senior chief again. I left the ship without one “I told you so.”

After being removed for medical reasons, a new obstacle arose. I could no longer go to Dallas MEPS because I had to be near a navy medical facility to go through rehab. The lady who had worked so hard to get me qualified for the MEPS program and had given me my orders to Dallas said there was nothing she could do. I even tried to get an orthopedic doctor whom I had randomly found in Dallas to agree to continue my rehab. I had him fax over a statement saying that he would treat me.

Nothing seemed to work. A few days later I was holding new orders in my hand that said I would spend the next three years in Norfolk, Virginia, at a shore station. I

33 couldn’t believe it! After all that I had overcome and every miracle, this was how it was going to end? I wanted to be angry with God, but I had learned to be thankful for everything. I was a little disappointed, but I refused to get angry with God.

I then called the lady in Washington who had worked so hard to obtain my original orders to Dallas MEPS and told her how much I appreciated her hard work and that I understood why she had to cut the new orders.

She said, “What new orders?”

"The ones I got for Norfolk."

She said, “Oh, I cancelled those orders this morning. You were never meant to see them. I was able to get them to accept the doctor’s letter and allow you to keep your orders to Texas.”

I could almost hear God laughing at me for finally giving up and believing I was not going to Texas. It was like being a kid waiting for that present from Santa that you wanted so badly and opening every present to find that it wasn’t under the tree. Then someone says, “Hey, look at that present over there behind the couch. I wonder what that could be.” I was amazed and thankful and ready to be reunited with my family.

10 Not Exactly a Fairy Tale Ending

I arrived in Texas and lived for a short time with my in-laws, who were definitely not happy about me being back in the picture. They treated me nicely, but I knew they wanted better for their daughter, and I couldn’t blame them. I was the picture perfect husband, though, after we reunited. I could tell that Mara was happy we were together again, but I knew there was a part of her that would remember my past mistakes for years to come and was silently waiting for the day she would decide to leave.

Shortly after I arrived home, our second daughter was born. Again I was overwhelmed with the miracle of this beautiful life. Serina was perfect, and I couldn’t have been happier with how things were going. I had my babies with me, and I was able to see my parents since we were now home in Texas. Mara and I joined a local church, and I got into the routine of working for the navy during the day and being home every night. Eventually I got a second job so Mara wouldn’t have to work.

Unfortunately, things went right back to where they had been before. Mara was never happy, and I never knew what I would be coming home to, but it didn’t matter. I was with my kids, and I deserved any bad thing she wanted to dish out. I became numb and tried to move past the fact that we weren't happy together and tried to be positive, but my failures haunted both of us. I didn’t feel worthy of being happy, and I knew she must be full of regret for staying with me, no matter how perfect I would be for the rest of my life.

I had learned to deal with the fact that Mara and I had lost our connection. We were intimate only every few months and even then there was no passion. I was not enjoying life anymore. Although I was grateful that I had my family and was able to see my kids every day, I was losing all passion for life, as was Mara. My walk with God was floundering because I was so focused on doing the right things and trying to make my family happy, with no sign of improvement, that I didn't have the emotional energy or desire to chase after God. I was feeling like an empty shell of a man.

One day when I came in from work, Mara had a spring in her step that I had not seen for many years. She said she needed to talk to me.

“I think I want to go back to school to finish my transcription degree,” she said.

I began to get excited, because she had shown no interest in doing anything for so long.

She added, “And I think I want to get a job.”

That got me really excited, because I was working two jobs and we could use the extra money.

Then she said, “And I think I want a divorce.”

I sat there dumbfounded while she told me about running into a guy she had dated while we were separated, before Hawaii. He told her that if she were his, he would treat her like a queen and she would never want for anything. After the way I treated her, I am sure that sounded like freedom. I didn’t know what to think or feel, but it sounded like freedom to me as well.

There is a scene in the movie "Forrest Gump" where Forrest is in a gym playing ping- pong by himself and a military man comes up and tells him he is going home and hands him his orders. Forrest says, “Does that mean I can’t play ping-pong no more?” and the guy responds, “Not for the army.”

The look on Forrest’s face changes from confusion to “is anyone going to try and stop me from leaving?” to running out the door as fast as he can and not stopping until he reaches his destination. That is exactly how I felt when it dawned on me that I had given everything I could to making my family work and now it was Mara who was making the choice to leave me. It wasn’t an empty emotional threat this time, she had a plan and was moving forward.

I wished her luck and we went our separate ways. I bought a single-wide mobile home in Denton, Texas, and moved in with everything I could fit into my Geo Metro. I didn’t

36 care if I had any of the things that we had bought together. I was ready to get on with my life and find the perfect marriage that I always believed was out there.

11 A Second Chance at Marriage

While I was separated from Mara and waiting for the divorce to go through, I dated a woman who was quite a bit younger than I was. There was a lot of physical chemistry between us, and as much as I wanted to control myself, we couldn't keep our hands off each other. So I ended that relationship to remove myself from temptation. I began to pray earnestly for God to send me a wife. I prayed that both my future wife and I would have the strength to refrain from sex until we were married, so that we could honor Him in our dating relationship. I wasn’t even divorced yet and I already wanted to get into a long-term relationship, but with the “right” one this time.

Immediately before the divorce, Mara tried to throw it back on me and said that she would be willing to stay married to me if I wanted to make it work.

I said, “Why don’t we go ahead with the divorce and then we can start dating each other again and see if we can get back to the point of wanting to be married to each other.”

Well, we never had our first date and I decided to get a vasectomy while I was choosing not to date and waiting for my divorce to go through. I knew that I didn’t want any more children, and a vasectomy was a surefire way to keep it from happening.

While visiting my parents two weeks after my divorce was final, I ran into an old classmate. Martha was Miss Popularity in high school, a cheerleader, and, at the time, way out of my league, so I was surprised that she seemed to be flirting with me. She was also seeking a relationship with God and seemed to be on the same path that I was. I prayed to God that the two of us could refrain from sex so that we could make this relationship “right”. So we began dating and I adored Martha.

To make a not so long story shorter, six weeks later we were married. The good news is that we waited until after we were married to have a sexual relationship. The bad news is that my prayer for the two of us to refrain from sex seemed to carry into the marriage! Martha was a wonderful and thoughtful person that overextended herself and would

38 become overwhelmed with her work. Martha had been a single mom for so many years that after the first couple of months, she was sleeping with her boys in one room, and I was sleeping in the master suite of the mobile home I had bought myself as a divorce gift. Her busy, overwhelming life soon found very little room for me. I took this time alone to start writing songs and playing the guitar again. Martha, exhausted from the day, would fall asleep in bed with her boys, and I would go to my room to spend time with God and write and sing.

I found myself growing close to God again and was very active in church. I spent a lot of time alone in my room and writing songs every night. My writing turned to worship, and I soon had a full repertoire of songs. Someone who heard me sing at church invited me to perform at a Christian coffee house where the owner wanted me to be his first performer when he opened. I loved singing for people and I especially loved speaking in between songs where I could share life lessons that God had shown me.

I enjoyed singing for groups of people, because I felt I was touching their lives in a special way. But there was one moment when I knew that something powerful was happening with my music. I was ministering to a man who had been in a coma for days and who was dying. His wife had been by his side for weeks while he hung onto life, and I told her I would sit with him so she could go to church.

While I was there I thought I would sing and read the Bible to him. I was singing a line from one of my songs, “You break down the walls that keep us apart,” when the man broke from the coma for a few seconds to say, “break down the walls.” I understood in my spirit that it meant he was ready to go, but his wife was not letting him.

When she arrived home, I told her what had happened and that it was time for her to let him go. She cried and said okay. I was leaving town the next day and decided to drop by and visit them before I left. I arrived just moments after he passed away. She came to the door and let me know that he had gone on very peacefully. He was still lying in bed with a peaceful smile on his face.

I enjoyed the opportunities that music was opening up in my life. I often would get to perform at church and share new songs I had written. One day one of the youth

39 members who was in a band asked if his band could learn some of my songs. Their band had entered a battle of the bands for local Christian bands that would take place in Dallas. Their lead singer was not able to make it in for the competition, and they wanted to know if I could sing some of my songs with them backing me. We didn't have a chance of winning, but they thought it would be fun. It didn’t matter to the guys in the band, because they were getting to play in front of an audience doing what they loved to do.

After a couple of practices, we had learned three songs that we played at the battle of the bands in front of record producers and radio personalities. We went up against bands that already had a following at a time when moshing was becoming popular among the youth. Moshing is when a large group of people on the dance floor jump up and down and slam themselves into each other. The mosh pit was popular even among Christian youth. The judges loved us, but the kids loved the more entertaining mosh band that had lyrics like, “If you believe my God is dead, then you’re a stupid head." Not kidding.

Afterwards we were brought into a room where the judges asked us questions. They thought we had been together for a while, because the songs were executed so well. Despite the fact that we didn’t win the competition, they said that if we could get ten songs together, they would put us in front of all the right people and book us on the concert circuits. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. We had the chance of a lifetime, and these would be my songs that the world was hearing. I was extremely excited about the possibilities.

With the opportunity to perform my songs as part of a real band, I was faced with a dilemma. When I told Martha about the opportunity to play my songs, she was anything but supportive. She seemed really upset and told me that I was not ready and would fail. She decided she was going to move back to our hometown, Henrietta, and told me that I could come along if I wanted. I prayed about it and felt that God would have blessed me either way. However, I decided that I would be a hypocrite if I was singing with a Christian band and let my marriage fail. Martha was going with or without me and landed a job back in our hometown. She moved back shortly before my last tour of duty was complete.

I was at the end of my tour in the navy, so I chose to get out and follow my wife. I packed up my things and moved back to our small town, not knowing what I would do for a job.

12 A Punch from Left Field

With the navy behind me, I went to work for a car dealership. I thought about the band and the church I had left and all the insecurity I felt in my marriage. I don’t know where that band could have gone or how big we could have become, but to me nothing mattered more than doing the right thing. I had spent enough of my life choosing to do the wrong thing and I was not going to let this one end with me being selfish. I really loved Martha and, much like Mara, thought she could do no wrong and it was up to me to make her happy and fulfilled. I was bound and determined to make it work.

We began going to the little church I had grown up in, the one that I had spent my entire adult life trying to get away from. It was literally in our backyard. The pastor was a fairly new pastor and didn’t have much experience. Martha and I became friends with him and his wife, and they quickly put us to work, helping to take care of a group of kids that met on Wednesday nights. Over thirty kids between eight and twelve years old, with little in the way of a home life, were dropped off for us to care for. It was obvious that they had disciplinary problems outside of church, but when they got together it was multiplied, and we had all of them in one big room.

I watched as the fledgling pastor struggled to teach them while the adults who were present spent the entire time correcting them and trying to make them sit still and listen. He eventually asked if I could teach one night and shared that he wanted my wife and me to take over the Wednesday night duties. I agreed and was excited to have the chance to minister to these kids.

Martha and I were still trying to figure out how to be a married couple. The only thing we had in common was church and rarely had moments where we seemed to be close to each other in any other way. I had gotten use to the fact that she had no desire to be intimate with me physically. I had stopped pursuing it and figured I would have to live with the fact that I was never going to have that part of a relationship again. I had learned my lesson when it came to cheating, so I wasn't going to cheat. The way things

42 were going, if we were ever going to be physical, it would require a miracle. However, I had God and He was about to use me again.

On my night to teach the kids, I had prepared a message that I thought they would enjoy hearing. I will never forget it. It was relating how the Spirit world works, through the illustration of the Power Rangers. I explained that God is a Spirit and He gives us power to overcome evil. Every kid sat motionless through the entire lesson as they soaked in every word. I looked over at the pastor’s wife, who had a look on her face I will never forget. She wasn’t happy that the kids were getting it; she looked threatened and offended. The night ended with the kids gathering in a circle and praying for each other.

That was an amazing night and Martha and I even found some time to be together intimately. I had the strangest experience happen immediately afterwards. Something out of the blue impressed in my mind something that shocked me, the impression said “That was a grudge _____ and it will be the last time you ever do it.” It knocked the wind out of me and was confusing. Why would I even think something that brash with things seemingly moving forward? I reasoned that it was just my own fears that created the impression. I just tried my best to shake it off and push it out of my head.

The next day the pastor asked me to visit him in his office to discuss Wednesday night. I thought he was going to tell me how great it was to see the kids interact the way they had, but I got a punch from left field instead. “John," he said in a condescending tone, "How many times a day do you need to have sex to be satisfied?”

I felt blindsided and thought that it must be a joke or something. I, half joking, replied, “Once or twice a month would be awesome at this point.”

“Um-hum, John, have you ever had a problem with pornography?” He glared at me with a look that said, I’m not going to believe you no matter what you say. He leaned back in his chair with his fingers crossed over his midsection and peered at me through the bottom part of his glasses.

“I have looked at it before, but, no, I don’t have a need to look at it on any kind of regular basis. Why are you asking me these things?”

He continued in his condescending manner and sidestepping my question, “And oh, by the way, we need to continue the format I was teaching the kids on Wednesday night. How are they supposed to understand who the Spirit is if they don’t even know who Noah is?”

By then I had reached my offended threshold and told him he could have his Wednesday night class and that I wouldn’t be back. I had done what I thought I was supposed to do for God and now I felt like I was being viewed as a sexual deviant. I was humiliated and angry. I thought to myself that my wife had to be the one who made me look that way to the pastor and his wife. The judgment I felt broke me, and a dark cloud attached itself to me.

The devil apparently wasn’t done seeking revenge and once again I fell prey to his devices. I walked out the church door, walked into our back door, and told Martha that I wanted a divorce. I went to my closet, gathered what clothes I had, and left. We, of course, never touched each other again, just as I was told.

13 Ask and You Shall Receive

I went to the store and bought a pack of cigarettes for the first time in years, then drove to my parents’ house and gave up on life and on God. After years of trying to live a clean life, I had reached the point where I was sick of the person I was and wished I could die. I had tried so hard to live right, and time and time again I was a big failure. I couldn’t make my first wife happy, my second wife thought I was a sexual deviant, and here I was, a grown man, living with my parents again.

My mom and dad had a small camper trailer that sat in front of their house, which I made my new home. It had air conditioning, a full-sized bed, a small living area, a working toilet, and a shower. I had reached what I considered the depths of despair. I quit my job selling cars and went to work on the night shift at a factory making a little over $8 an hour. One paycheck went to child support and the other paid for my car. My future didn’t look bright. At the rate I was going, it seemed I would never be able to live on my own again.

The factory job had medical insurance and a program for mental counseling, so I went to a counselor for a while. I began taking anti-depressants and searching for answers about who I was as a person. I spent hours reading and trying to figure out what was wrong with me. Why couldn’t I get my life straight? How could I work so hard and get so close to God, only to be a cheater and a loser? Why couldn’t I be happy with a job and stick with it? Why couldn’t I ever make my wife happy? What was so wrong with me that every woman I was ever in a relationship with eventually became miserable and didn’t want to be with me?

One day as I was reading a book called The Personality Tree, I learned that much of our personality comes from biological sources; in other words, we inherit a large part of our personality. I was adopted at birth, so I felt pretty hopeless that I would ever understand who I was or be able to answer these questions about what was wrong with me. My mom and dad were wonderful people, but I wasn't like either of them. I lay there in my parents' camper trailer asking God, “How the heck will I ever know my biological family?”

About that time my dad knocked on the door of the camper and said that he and mom needed to tell me something. I went into the house, and immediately my mom started to cry. I asked her what was wrong. Did somebody die? What was going on?

They told me the story of meeting June, my biological mother, before I was born and that June had promised to never interfere or try to get involved with me in any way. However, her husband Paul, the father of her other children, was dying of cancer, and one of his last requests was that she attempt to reunite with the son she had given away for adoption, the son she had lost so long ago. June had written me a letter and sent it to my parents hoping they would share the letter with me. She told them that it was up to them, but she was following the wishes of her dying husband. I was in shock, because I had never known any of this. They knew all along who she was and where she was, but they had never said a word.

My mom and dad handed me the letter. I couldn’t believe what I read. I could tell she thought just like me by the way she wrote, even putting a title on the letter, “The Unforgotten Child.” That was just the kind of cheesy and sentimental thing I would do. The letter told me of my brother and three sisters that she had with her husband. I felt like I was in a dream. She left her phone number at the bottom of the letter and said she would love to talk to me if I wanted to talk to her.

I made the call. My heart raced as the phone rang and I waited to hear the voice that I had wanted to hear most of my life.

A young girl answered the phone and said to someone in the room, “Mom, you have a phone call.”

A woman in the background told her that she was busy and couldn’t take the call.

I asked the girl to tell her, “It’s the unforgotten child.”

The girl repeated what I said in a confused voice, “He says he’s the unforgotten child?”

I then heard the voice of my biological mother in the background. “Oh, my God,” and she took the phone.

Less than thirty minutes earlier I was feeling hopeless that I would ever know where I came from, and now I was on the phone with my biological mother! There is no one who can tell me that God doesn’t care about what we want in life. He just knows how to get us to a place where we will appreciate it when it arrives.

14 A Missing Piece

My whole biological family on my mother’s side lived in Houston, and they were all very eager to meet me. I asked my parents if they would have a problem with me visiting them and they reluctantly gave their blessing. A few days later I bought a bus ticket and headed to Houston to meet my blood relatives for the first time. I was scared and excited. What if they didn't like me? What if we didn't get along or want to have anything to do with each other after this?

The bus ride from Henrietta to Houston was just over six hours, but it seemed like an eternity as I anxiously thought about how the meeting would go. I befriended the guy who was sitting next to me, and talking with him helped pass the time. I had brought a video camera and I asked if he would mind videotaping me meeting my family for the first time. He was very happy to be able to participate.

My heart pounded as we approached the bus station. I tried to see through the bus window and to catch anything I could on video, but I couldn’t see anyone from the street. It wasn’t until we came to a stop that I saw a group of ten people holding signs over their heads that read, “We Love You! Welcome Home!” and jumping up and down.

Everything was moving so fast, and it was so crowded in the station, that they didn’t see my new friend and me get off the bus. I handed him the video camera and approached them from the back. “Hello!” I said.

Everyone turned, and my sisters and my brother began hugging me. I finally made it through this love gauntlet to see a small woman who looked a lot like me waiting patiently for her turn. She held onto me for a while, and over her shoulder I saw the look of satisfaction on her husband's face. His last request had been fulfilled, and he was able to see it with his own eyes.

I thanked my new friend for videotaping our meeting, and we loaded into several cars and headed to my mother’s house. It was a whirlwind of emotion and excitement for everyone, and we stayed up until the early hours of the morning talking and sharing.

My sister Krissa played the guitar and sang songs that she had written. Then my mother, June, played the guitar and sang a few songs as well. I was surprised and impressed to find out that she could yodel! I was able to play some of the songs I had written, too. I couldn’t believe that I was sitting in a room playing guitar and singing with my mother and sister. I realized that music was in my blood and The Personality Tree was right. Although my blood relations had not influenced my growing up, I carried many of their attributes.

I could hardly believe how much I had in common with these people I'd never met before. There was a moment when my brother and sisters laughed hysterically: they saw my mother and me walking next to each other and noticed that we had the exact same walk. I looked more like June than any of the other kids, and our personalities were much the same. June loved to write and sing and worked very hard to try and please everyone, just as I did. It was an amazing find, one that helped me realize that what was wrong with me was something I couldn’t help. I felt that now I would be able to better understand how to overcome my faults. This connection with my biological mother put me at peace.

Every person had their moment with me over the weekend. My brother Jason, who had a beard since high school, shaved his beard off in order to look more like me. It was very moving to see him want to emulate me. My sisters Lisa and Kim told me about their lives and struggles over the years, and I got to play big brother and give them advice.

One night we all went out to a dance place in Houston, where I was struck to see some of the ugliest women I had ever seen. It didn’t take us long to realize we had accidentally visited on transvestite night, and all these ugly women were actually men. We had a blast, and we all danced to “We Are Family – I Got All My Sisters and Me!”

I even had a moment where I got a chance to talk to Paul. Weak, bald from chemotherapy, and fading fast, Paul expressed to me his joy in getting to see June reunited with her long-lost son.

Meeting my biological family was a deeply moving experience. I couldn’t believe that in the midst of my rebelling against God, He would find it in His heart to answer my prayer to know my family and bring about this beautiful reunion. The thing is, God not only answered my prayer. He also answered the prayers of many others in that one life event.

15 The Cycle Begins

I returned home with renewed vigor for life and a new passion for trying to make something of myself. I applied for a sales position with a local beer distributor and got the job. Soon I was making enough money to rent a house in Wichita Falls at $400 per month. I was on my way again, until I ran into an ex-girlfriend from high school--my first girlfriend, the first girl I ever kissed, the one who started it all.

While looking at the newspaper one day, I decided to glance over the obituaries. I noticed that my first love’s dad had passed away and thought I would like to show my respects. She was married and living with her husband in Irving, Texas, so I figured there was no chance of anything happening between us. What I didn’t know at that time was they were all but divorced and she was basically waiting for the paperwork to be completed.

After the funeral she invited me to come back to hang out with her, her sister, and her family at her sister's house. We stayed up talking about the past and laughed about how stupid we were as kids. Before the night was through, we were feeling those feelings we had had as teenagers. When we dated in high school we never went all the way, so after everyone fell asleep, we caught up for lost time. The passion was intense and we spent the next few days together before she had to go back home where she still had to live with her soon to be ex-husband. It was a very emotional time for her since she had just lost her dad, so she became very attached to me as the one who brought joy in the midst of tragedy. She moved out of her husband’s house and would come visit me as much as she could. It was miserable when we couldn’t be together, so as soon as I could, I took a job at Frito Lay in the Dallas area so we could move in together.

We were in love and were going to be together forever. Forever turned out to be less than a year. She felt I was pressuring her to get married and she just wasn’t ready, so she broke up with me and we became roommates. She started talking to guys online and realized that she wasn’t ready to settle down. As for me, I shifted into the role of roommate and tried my best to fit into my new role as best friend. She only met one guy

51 while we were living together and she brought him home so I could meet him. I smiled and was nice and acted like the best friend, but it broke me inside.

The final breaking point came when Frito Lay reassigned me to work weekends. This meant I would not be able to spend weekends with my daughters. With no girlfriend and missing time with my daughters, there was no reason for me to stay, so I told my now roommate that I was moving back to Henrietta. She was upset because we were sharing the rent for the house we were in, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to handle it on her own. Since I was moving back to Henrietta, she asked me to stay at her dad’s house and take care of it. So I agreed to stay at her dad's house and look after the place.

I returned to Henrietta on a Thursday and opened up the phone book looking for a job doing what I had learned at Frito Lay. I found the address to Tom’s Snacks and drove there the next day to ask about a job. The owner said he didn’t have a position, but he let me ride with the man who was watching the warehouse, and I impressed him with my chip delivering skills. They hired me on the spot. The next week I was given the route the owner had been running himself.

I was living at my ex-girlfriend's dad’s house and sharing the house with another guy who was one of her dad’s closest friends. One night I received a call while she was drinking with a guy she had started going out with. I could hear him in the background laughing and telling me where to go. She apparently thought it was funny, too, and was laughing at him. It was embarrassing and I felt like a big joke, so in my infinite wisdom I told her where they both could go, which didn’t seem too funny to her. She warned me that she and her new guy, who could shoot a gnat from 50 paces, were heading to her dad’s house and I better not be there by the time she got there if I knew what was good for me. It wasn't hard to figure out what was good for me. I loaded up the Tom’s truck and ran for the hills--literally, went back to the Hills' house.

Now I was back in my parent’s camper trailer for a second tour. This time I decided to grow my hair out and party for a while. The guys at Tom’s would gather around after work and smoke weed and laugh, which seemed like a good thing to do, since nothing was making me happy and I wanted some fun. Except that every time I smoked, I threw

52 up and couldn't see for several hours. I figured out quickly that what looked like fun from the outside was not so much fun for me when I joined in.

My stint as a drug addict didn’t last long. Instead, I spent several days a week going to bars and working out. I got pretty buff and was having success picking up women regularly as a half Sicilian/half Japanese player. Eventually I found myself dating three married women at the same time and feeling bad about myself. What had I turned into? Was there anything really meaningful or even fun about where I had ended up? The answer was no, of course, I wasn’t happy. I just wanted a real relationship where I could be safe and love the person forever.

I thought to myself, “Self, where was it that you were the happiest before the poo hit the fan?”

I determined it was when I was attending the little church in Denton, the church Martha and I were a part of before she left and went back to Henrietta. I realized my life had changed for the worse when I chose to follow Martha back to Henrietta and maybe if I went back to the Denton church, things would change again for the better, so I went back for a Sunday night service.

I showed up in my club clothes, the only nice clothes I had, and sporting an earring. The congregation was happy to see; everyone expressed sadness for me having to go through another divorce. I was talking to several people I knew when down the aisle came a young woman who had been in the youth group I had pastored years before. Rachel had grown up since then and had become an attractive young woman. She gave me a hug and asked if I wanted to go have ice cream with her.

I thought, Rachel is so much younger than I am and devoted to God, what could happen? I said, “Sure,” and we went in her car to have ice cream.

As we talked, she let me know that she was not the teenager I once knew; she was a grown woman with her own apartment. I tried to avoid saying anything that might give her the impression that I was interested in her on a physical level and told her that I had better be going.

On the way back to the church where my car was parked, she said, “Hey, do you want to see my new apartment?”

I glanced at my car as we drove past the driveway entrance and felt the heaviness of where I knew this was going. Once at her apartment, she introduced me to her roommate. Whew! Someone was there, so I might be able to avoid what usually happened when I got invited back to a woman’s apartment.

We sat on the couch and she scooted up next to me. I wanted to go home, but my hand decided it wanted to stay and placed itself on her leg. I sat there awkwardly looking at my hand on her knee for what seemed like a lifetime. I could tell Rachel was a little nervous, but I felt that she wasn’t moving her leg in fear of me changing my mind and taking my hand away. After about ten minutes, she got up and announced to the room that she needed to change. As she walked away, she looked at me with a gleam in her eye. I took that to mean she wanted me to go with her, so I followed her into her bedroom. She had already began to undress when I opened the door and stepped in.

She acted shocked. “What are you doing in here?”

I was like, “Oh, crap, sorry,” and started to leave when she told me I could stay.

We did what we both went there to do and afterwards I asked her to take me back to my car. I was so disappointed in myself. I had driven all the way back to Denton to pick up the baton and start my new life over with God, and instead I picked up a girl that was fourteen years younger than I was and had meaningless sex like I always did. That may not sound so bad to some people, but it was pretty devastating to me. I really cared about this girl and was a spiritual leader to her at one time and here I was, giving into lust again. She dropped me off at my car and asked if I would call her.

I said, “Nope. This was a huge mistake and you will never hear from me again.” However, less than a year later we were married.

16 The Final Missing Piece

A few months after I started dating Rachel, I went to visit June and the family to introduce them to my new love. While I was there I questioned June about where she had met my biological father, Rick. She told me the story of a lonely young girl whose father had been sent away on a mission with the military. She found comfort in this attractive and popular boy who had a great interest in her. He was athletic and was an amazing surfer. She became smitten with him, and they made love only once. It was the first time for both of them. The relationship was short-lived, and not long afterward she found out she was pregnant.

As I mentioned earlier, June kept it a secret for as long as she could, because she knew that her mother would make her get an abortion and she didn’t want to take a life. As her belly grew, she finally had to tell her parents. They decided to meet with Rick and his parents to tell them about the pregnancy. It was decided that the baby would be put up for adoption. June’s parents were moving to Shepherd Air Force base in Wichita Falls, either because of the pregnancy, or perhaps June's father was at the end of his military tour. Rick was extremely nervous and confused and tried to deny that the baby was his, but he finally admitted it, relieved that he wouldn’t be responsible for child support. He was a sixteen-year-old boy who was far from ready to take on that level of responsibility.

June gave me the name of the town where they had met and the high school they attended, so I went online and started doing research. I decided to call the school to see if they had a coordinator for class reunions. When I told the woman my story, she expressed amazement. Even more amazing for me, she had gone to school with Rick and remembered him well. She said, “Oh, your dad was a handsome guy!”

She told me that everyone she knew had lost track of Rick, but she had the names of his best friends from school and was able to give me contact information for one of them, a photographer named Nick Galante who lived in Hawaii. I found Nick's website and called him. He too had lost touch with Rick, but thought of another friend who might know where Rick was.

The second friend contacted Rick to let him know his biological son was looking for him. He asked Rick if he wanted me to have his phone number. The next thing I knew, I was talking to my biological father on the phone.

"Duuuude, I am so stoked!” Rick said when we first talked. I had flashbacks of Fast Times at Ridgemont High as Jeff Spicoli dreamed of winning the surfing competition.

Could my biological father still be a stoned surfer dude? I was excited and a little disturbed throughout our conversation. He seemed like a kid who had never grown up but had an innocence that was endearing. He told me about his two girls in California and his four other children who lived with him and his wife Valerie in Hawaii. We made plans for me to come to Hawaii and meet the rest of his family.

He gave me the phone number for his two oldest daughters, Lisa and Shonna, who were living together in California. I called them and they were as excited as I was to meet, so I decided that I would lay over in Los Angeles for two days before flying on to Hawaii.

There were many similarities between Rick and myself. Rick had two girls from his first marriage, just as I had. His first girl was blonde and the second was brunette, just like mine. He had a short second marriage with no kids, just as I had. Then he married a woman much younger than him and had four more kids. I hadn't married again, and I had had a vasectomy after my divorce from Mara, so I had literally cut that pattern off at the pass.

A couple of months after our phone conversation, I booked a flight to Hawaii and decided to have a layover in California so I could meet two missing pieces of my biological puzzle, Lisa and Shonna. They were two very fun young women and we had a great time at their Santa Barbara apartment. They showed me pictures of themselves as children, and we drank wine and laughed all night. The next day they took me to Six Flags and later introduced me to their party friends and we went bar hopping.

Throughout the visit they told me stories of life with Rick when they were young. Their childhood had been very unstructured, as though Rick had been their younger brother

56 rather than their dad. I didn’t know what to expect when I met Rick, but I was feeling a little nervous. After a great couple of days, Shonna drove me to the airport. With what little I knew of Rick, I wasn’t impressed thus far.

The plane landed on Oahu, and I followed the corridor to the waiting area. This time there were no signs and no crowd to greet me. In fact, no one met me. I went to a pay phone and called Rick’s number. When no one answered, I left a couple of messages. Nearly an hour later I was the only one left in the airport, and I had no backup plan. Could he really have forgotten me?

I made my way to the baggage claim area hoping he would think to go there, but there was no one. Finally I sat down in baggage claim and gave up. About that time, a beat- up van pulled up just outside the automatic glass doors. The van was everything I would expect from a surfer dude, complete with a long surfboard stretching from the back of the van, with the tip of the board resting between the tattered bucket seats. The man who was driving anxiously peered through the van window at me but didn't get out. I walked outside and approached the van.

The man yelled out the passenger window, “Hey, you John?”

With a disheartened gulp I acknowledged that I was and crawled into the front seat, tossing my bags in the back.

Rick, physically fit and looking young for his age of fifty, was wearing a worn-out ball cap with reddish-blonde hair hanging out the back. He sported a black Hawaiian shirt with big white flowers, shorts, and flip flops. He immediately began to apologize and said he had come earlier, but had forgotten that he had to pick the kids up from school, so he left to get them and take them home first. Then he could come back to the airport to meet me.

He bounced around like a hyper teenager as he told me about all the drama, then stopped and looked over at me with a big smile. “Dude, like, you are my son!”

I was angry that he hadn’t planned better, but the innocent look in his eyes made me realize that he had not intentionally forgotten me. I saw a part of me in him and realized what I could be like if I followed my own desires without taking other people into consideration. It seemed to me that Rick had never grasped the concept of putting others first and was living by the seat of his pants. Many times I had allowed myself to be that person, times when I had hurt people’s feelings without meaning to, because I would be forgetful or not listen.

We drove up to a 1000-square-foot concrete block house, tucked away on a winding street lined with island greenery. When we got to the house, Rick showed me pictures lined along the entertainment center and hanging on the hallway ways and talked about each one. He pointed out a picture of himself with his dad, a full-blooded Sicilian, then went through the pictures of the kids and his wife, Valerie. Rick and Valerie had two older boys and a one-year-old set of twins, a boy and a girl. I met my three little brothers, but not the girl, who was staying with an aunt the week I visited. They were all much younger than I was, and I didn’t get to spend much time with them because they were in school during the day and playing at their friends' houses after school.

Valerie, who worked as a nurse on a rotating schedule, was gone the first night, and I watched Rick try to take care of the kids. He was very impatient and scattered. He seemed more annoyed and frustrated than happy that I was there. I finally asked him about his guitar and he pulled it out and played a few pieces.

He was a highly skilled guitarist, and I could tell that this was where his passion lay. I decided to play something for him that I had written, but he became bored quickly. Before I had finished the first verse, he was looking around as though he had better things to do. I was a little embarrassed, but I didn’t allow myself to be offended, reasoning that there was something seriously wrong with this man.

I followed Rick around for five days. Our time together, when I wasn't watching him surf or play guitar, was mostly spent talking in the car. He would start out before the sun came up to go surfing, then come back to the house and sleep the rest of the day. He woke up in time to grab his guitar and head to the restaurant where he played his gigs.

I got to watch him play his guitar while masterfully managing his electronic drum machine, which was his only backup music. He was considered the “human jukebox” by many of his peers and the regulars who frequented the restaurants where he would perform. He could sing and play hundreds of songs by memory and often left his sets open to requests.

I loved watching him play and videotaped many of the songs he played the first night at the restaurant. Once he was done with his gig, we hopped in the van and headed home, then he called the surf report to find out where the waves were going to be the next day and went straight to bed. He was so busy playing guitar and surfing that he had no time for the kids or his wife and, even with me there, he didn’t change his routine. I was left alone or with Valerie while he slept, and I went wherever he went when he was awake.

The first morning, as we were driving to where he would surf, Rick asked me if I smoked. I told him that I did smoke cigarettes and he quickly said, “No, do you smoke?”

I realized that he was asking if I smoked marijuana. I told him no, but I didn’t mind if he did. He said that he had quit two weeks before I arrived so he wouldn’t be “jonesing” when I got here. If you haven't been addicted to something, you may not know that “jonesing” refers to a craving so overwhelming that you are on edge and feel like screaming out loud. I never saw him smoke, but I thought that he probably slipped in a few tokes when I wasn’t looking, feeling justified that he had covered his bases by talking to me about it first.

Valerie was the main caregiver for the family. She seemed like a saint to me, to take on the responsibility for the house and kids without much help from Rick. He was obviously difficult to count on. Like everyone else who knew Rick, Valerie seemed to understand him and forgive his irresponsibility. She told me what a wonderful heart he had. This radical poster adult for Attention Deficit Disorder was someone I couldn’t help but love. He was untethered and lived life doing what he loved. I felt he would never hurt anyone on purpose.

After five days I was ready to go home. By the time I left, I felt that we had bonded, even though I had merely been his shadow. I felt sad when we had to part. It was as though he was my long-lost son instead of the other way around. He dropped me off at the airport, I gave him a hug, and we said our goodbyes. There was a connection that I couldn’t explain. We were going to be close, and this visit would not shape our future relationship.

Rachel was at the airport waiting to pick me up. I told her about my trip, and we went back to our lives. Shortly after meeting Rick, I took a job selling newspaper advertising in the Dallas area, so I moved from my parents’ house and rented an apartment in Denton close to where I had lived before. Rachel and her roommate broke their lease and she came to live with me. We did not live together long before we were married.

17 Going to Get This One Right

I was on my third marriage, and I was determined to do this one right. I could tell I was on the right track because her parents hated me and refused to walk her down the aisle. Her dad called me a two-time loser and told her she was f-ing up her life. I had made an extremely godly man say the “f” word. I didn’t let that get me down, though, and did everything in my power to prove him wrong. In less than a year, they accepted me. They realized that I loved Rachel and felt I was the best thing that had ever happened to her.

It was great that I was back in church and straightening out my life again. My bar hopping days were over, and I was settling down and making good decisions. My work in advertising sales was going well, and life seemed to be finally heading in the right direction.

Rachel had her own set of issues, but I thought there was nothing that time wouldn’t fix. I had forgotten how dramatic things were when I was in my early twenties. She had to learn to trust, and the first few years were really tough as she questioned me about what I did every minute of my day. She also threw fits when she didn’t get her way and would slam doors and throw things. I worked very hard to give her the things she needed and wanted, and I knew that she worshiped the thin ice I walked on.

A couple of years after Rachel and I were married, I received a call from Rick’s wife Valerie. She was crying and said that Rick was going through a deep depression. She asked if I would talk to him, because he hadn’t slept in days. I said that I would and she managed to get him on the phone.

Rick told me that they had had to move to Maui where he had no gigs and the surfing was awful. Rick had lost his job at the restaurant and Valerie got a better job in Maui, where her mother and father lived. Unfortunately, the move had spiraled him into a deep depression, and he didn’t know what he was supposed to do with his life.

I believe God was with me during that conversation, as I talked with Rick about his purpose in life. I told him that God had given him a gift--his music--and a beautiful family. He said that he'd had a relationship with God when he was younger and told me how God had moved in his life. I could sense that his spirit was lighting up, and his voice became more alive. We prayed, and he asked Jesus to come back into his life and lead him. I was honored to be able to play a part in bringing Rick back to the Lord.

About a month later Valerie called again, crying, to tell me that Rick had passed away. He had been watching a local band practice and began to act funny and say things that didn’t make sense. A few minutes later he was lying on the floor. The coroner determined that he had had a massive heart attack.

Valerie asked me to call Lisa and Shonna, which was uncomfortable for me, but of course I agreed to do it. They were shocked and heart-broken but thanked me for letting them know. I didn’t get a chance to know Rick as well as I would have liked, but I was surprised at how deeply it saddened me to know that my father would no longer be a part of my life.

18 Too Little Too Late

Rachel and I were growing together, and we were never apart. Outside of work, we spent all of our time together. We were also getting closer to the Lord, and God was using us in our church. We became leaders in the church and were involved in ministry at the Denton County jail. Because our lives centered around church and being together, I couldn't understand why she was so jealous of my time and complained about getting no attention.

The only time we were with other people was when my daughters came to visit. Then Rachel would get angry about the girls leaving their shoes in the living room or not using a coaster. It would turn into a huge fight where she would go to the bedroom and slam the door behind her. She picked a fight every time the girls came to visit, and I knew it was because she wasn’t the center of attention. It was as though she was still a child. I spent most of my time consoling her and trying to give her the attention she wanted. She eventually grew out of most of the jealousy, but it required a lot of time, energy, and patience on both our parts to reach that point.

Rachel had to put up with a few things that were less than optimal for her as well. My mom had begun falling, and I felt it was necessary to take care of my aging parents. I began trying to figure out a way to get them closer to us. One day while visiting my parents, I made the mistake of mentioning the idea of us all living together before I had discussed the idea with Rachel. My parents became very excited, but Rachel voiced her displeasure as soon as she and I were alone. She wasn’t happy about my making such a big decision without discussing it with her first and felt that she would be seen as the bad guy if she didn't go along with my idea. I realized my mistake and told her I could tell my parents that we couldn’t live together, but Rachel said she would get over it, and we started looking for a place where we all could live.

At that point Rachel and I couldn't qualify to buy a real house on our own. The only way we would be able to get out of our apartment any time soon, and into a house, was with the help of my parents. We decided to look at double-wide mobile homes and found one that had two living areas and bedrooms on opposite ends of the house. It

63 was the perfect set-up. With my parents co-signing, we were able to buy a double-wide mobile home on two acres. Things couldn’t get any better for me, but Rachel wanted our own house.

Since my work was going well, our credit started to improve. After a couple of years Rachel and I began looking at home builders and found a neighborhood that interested us. We applied, and to our surprise we qualified. I found a subsidized senior apartment complex where my parents could afford to live on their own, close enough for me to take care of them. Unfortunately we were unable to find a buyer for the mobile home and it was repossessed--the second mobile home lost to repossession.

Now that my parents were in their place and we were in ours I thought she would be completely happy. However, one thing that she could never accept about me was that I was a dreamer. I would get involved in network marketing or online marketing to try and create an income that would provide the life that I knew she eventually wanted. There was a part of me that would never be happy working for someone else and I wanted to create something. I didn’t understand why, but something in me aspired to be more than someone’s employee. This was a very sore spot for Rachel and she would get angry every time she saw me on my computer. I had to limit my time on the computer to early mornings before she woke up and I would occasionally jump on while she was in the shower. My hands were tied when it came to building something significant without the time to put my best effort into it, but I wanted to make Rachel happy and she obviously hated when I focused my attention on my dreams.

I can honestly say that I put everything I had into this marriage. I never once put myself in a position that could look like infidelity, and I did everything she asked me to do. I was able to give her the home she wanted and a nice car, and I attempted two vasectomy reversals in order for us to have a child. Both reversals failed, and I ended up refinancing my truck so that we could buy sperm from a donor agency in the hope that in vitro fertilization would allow her to have a child. After all that, Rachel was still barren.

A few weeks after we found out that the in vitro didn’t work, Rachel broke the news that she was unhappy and wanted to try and make it on her own. I was devastated, to

64 say the least. Rachel had always complained that I never gave her enough attention, but I never fully understood why. I asked her to remember all that I had done in that last year to give her everything she wanted. I will never forget her words, “It’s just too little, too late.” I assumed the blame, but she later admitted that, once she knew we couldn't have children, she had started cheating on me. She would tell me stories and joke about “the hot IT guy at work," but I never imagined that she was cheating on me with him.

I hit another downward spiral. I had thought things were going great between us. She was my best friend and I trusted her. Why couldn’t I have the relationship I wanted and find someone who loved me as much as I loved them? What was so wrong with me that I couldn’t make someone happy? It broke my heart. I lost my job, my house was repossessed, and I didn’t even have my parents' camper trailer to return to. I had no idea what I was going to do when the bank finally kicked me out of the house. I hit bottom like I had done so many times before.

19 Meeting of the Ex-es

As I was waiting to get kicked out of the house, I received a call. The woman on the other end of the line said, “Hi, is this John Hill, married to Rachel?”

I said, “Yep, but not for long.”

“I'm Regina. We have something in common. Your wife is having sex with my husband.”

“Oh, hi, how are you doing?”

I spoke to her with compassion, because I knew she must be going through hell like I was. We talked for four hours and as a result decided to meet. She came over to the house and minutes later we were having revenge sex on the couch. I had no interest in her physically, but we both wanted to get our spouses back for what they had done to us.

Regina and I quickly became friends and agreed to be "friends with benefits." She came over often, and we would talk for hours and laugh like crazy. Regina was smart with a sharp wit and thought I was the funniest guy she had ever met. She helped me with my car payment and helped me get my head straight. One day she offered to let me move into her new two-bedroom apartment. I didn’t have anywhere else to go and no money to speak of, so I moved in with the ex-wife of my soon-to-be-ex-wife’s lover.

My ex-wife dumped her ex-husband shortly after getting out on her own and found another guy with whom she began a relationship. It seemed like poetic justice. The two who had left us alone and broken were now no longer together, while Regina and I were no longer alone and healing.

I had a huge garage sale and sold everything that was left in the house and gave it to my new roommate to pay the first set of bills. Regina took good care of me while we were together, but she definitely wanted to be more than friends. I found a job at a

66 yellow pages company where I worked for a few months before I realized that I could make money building websites. I quit working for other people and started building websites for $500 a website. Soon I had a decent portfolio and started charging more.

I reached the point where I felt I could move out on my own, but Regina didn’t take it very well. The first time I mentioned living on my own she became very upset and had what appeared to be a diabetic attack, which scared me. I had to give her orange juice to help her regain consciousness. She thanked me and said that she would have died if I hadn’t been there to save her. This happened again the next time I brought up the idea of moving out, so I figured out that it was probably an act. Still, I felt guilty and decided to stay for a while longer.

Regina tried to convince me that we were perfect for each other. We were such good friends, she said, and it would be a great marriage long-term. The fact that I didn’t feel the physical attraction was not an issue to her. As much as I loved her as a person and a friend, my heart never crossed over to that place where I wanted to marry her.

I did not want to get married again and had no feelings deeper than friendship, but she convinced me to go as far as getting engaged. I even asked her dad for her hand. I knew that I only wanted to be friends and was trying to force myself into marrying her so that I wouldn’t hurt the people who had helped me at the lowest point in my life.

I started feeling sick to my stomach and began having panic attacks at the thought of marrying again. It wasn’t that Regina wouldn’t be a good and loyal wife, but it didn't feel right. I finally had to tell her that I was not interested in marrying her and I was moving out in one month. It broke her heart and the hearts of her family who were now angry and hating me. This was the worst part for me, because I loved them all and wanted to keep Regina in my life as a friend. I was now a huge hurt and disappointment to the ones I cared so much about.

I lived in the other bedroom that last month while I was waiting to move into my new apartment. The new place was a real dump, but it was going to be my dump, and no one could take it from me. Before I left, Regina said that she was dying of cancer and

67 needed a friend to help her through it. She couldn’t believe I would leave her when she needed me most.

I called her parents to tell them I was breaking up with her. They threatened to come after me if I ever talked to their daughter again. When I told them she said she had cancer and was dying, they said she was lying and would take care of it. I never heard from her again.

20 Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places

Soon after ending that relationship, I began the search for yet another woman to fill the infinite void that plagued my life. Why couldn’t I allow myself to be alone for any length of time? Why did I have to have a woman in my life? When would I get it right? These were questions I couldn’t answer.

I was now living on my own in my new apartment when a man I worked out with at the gym offered me a job selling home health care. On the new job I visited doctor’s offices where I carried a big basket of snacks to offer the nurses and try to form relationships with the doctors and staff, hoping they would refer patients who needed home health care.

On my rounds I met a single mother of two boys who was in her mid-twenties and fifteen years younger than me. Heather was tall and blonde, friendly and fun-loving, and had just gone through a separation. I was not in a place where I wanted to get into a relationship, but I didn’t want to be alone either, so I began thinking about who I might date.

I talked with Heather every time I visited the doctor’s office and we seemed to enjoy those short conversations, but I thought she was too tall for me. I had also found a website called Plenty of Fish and was getting dates left and right. I had returned to my cycle of dating women and having meaningless sex. As unfulfilling as it was, it was better than being alone, and my walk with God had once again become nonexistent.

One night Heather "friended" me on Facebook and asked if I wanted to meet her and her friends at TGI Fridays. I had a date with another woman who was supposed to come over after she got off work that night but I thought, what the heck, it could be fun and I can make it back home in time, so I went.

When I arrived, Heather said that her friends had just left. I never saw them, so I am not sure if they were ever there. We talked for about an hour before she said, “My apartment isn’t far from here. Do you want to just go hang out there?”

“Sounds like a great plan,” I said.

As soon as we walked through the door of her apartment, it became apparent what her intentions were. This was almost the opposite of my experience with Regina. I had no real interest in Heather as a friend, but I was extremely attracted to her. It was an intense chemical experience. It felt like I was high on drugs without all the throwing up and not being able to see for hours.

We had a cigarette three hours later and told each other that we did not want to get serious. I had sent a text message to the woman who was supposed to come over later to see if she was still going to make it, but I didn’t hear back from her at the time. About midnight I headed home and was going to crash, when I received a text saying that she had gotten stuck at work and still wanted to come over. So she did.

Heather called the next day to say she thought we had to do that again, so we spent time together for the next several months. I felt like I was a teenager again and thought to myself that this must be true love, as I had felt nothing like it before. The chemistry overwhelmed any common sense I may have had.

However, Heather was far from having her life together. I was starting to make good money building websites and I used all of it to bail her out of her payday loans and put a down payment on a car for her and her kids after her car was repossessed. I got to play the hero, and she rewarded me with loads of affection.

Heather also had a serious addiction to smoking weed and taking prescription drugs. Obviously she was a brilliant choice for me to get into a relationship with, so we decided to move in together. I left my little dump to move into her apartment, and a few weeks later we qualified for a rent-to-own home in Roanoke, Texas. I used my entire savings to put the down payment on the house and give her and her kids a place to live.

Not long after we moved in together, the chemical experience began to wane. Just two weeks after I moved in, Heather told me she still had feelings for her ex-husband. Then

I stumbled across an email she had sent to him telling him he was her best friend and that he could move in with her in the new house.

What? She was planning on moving him into our house and didn’t mention this to me? I decided to leave, but once Heather realized that her ex-husband didn’t want to have anything to do with her, she came crawling and bawling for me to forgive her. Having what I thought was such a deep love for her, I told her I would come back if she stopped using drugs. This made her very happy and she promised never to do drugs again.

Of course, Heather's drug problems worsened. She would speak to me rudely and snap at me for even looking at her. One day she told me that she felt disgusted when I touched her. She made up lies to keep from having sex, and when I tried to talk to her about it, she told me I was acting like a girl. I was once her knight in shining armor, and now she was acting as though I were a creepy stalker. However, the couple of times I got serious about leaving she broke down crying and told me she would change.

I stayed with Heather hoping she would change back to the affectionate person she had been in the beginning. She never changed for more than a couple of days at a time. She went on shopping sprees and spent all her money so that I would have to help her pay her bills. She would come in from shopping all excited, showing me everything she had bought for the kids and herself. Being the genius that I am, I began to realize that she was using me to support her and her kids and had no real interest in me.

One night I suddenly became very sick and was having a hard time breathing. Instead of caring for me, Heather became angry because I couldn’t help her take care of her kids. Stunned by her behavior, I realized she had no concern for my well-being. It had taken me six months to see that she was taking advantage of me. When I confronted her about it, she tried to make me feel stupid.

I finally got my fill and moved out. Shortly thereafter, Heather lost her nursing job where she was writing prescriptions for herself for hydrocodone, lost her kids to her ex- husband, and started stripping at a local club. I told myself I wouldn't give her another dollar, so I didn’t go visit her at work.

After I left, I couldn’t believe how I had let myself get so involved with her. She was nothing like what I wanted in a wife or girlfriend. The attraction was purely chemical, and my need to rescue her had hooked me emotionally. Could the mind really become that confused? How could something so wrong be so easily justified in my mind?

21 Striking Gold

Having nowhere else to go, I rented a room from my friend Steve. I had met Steve when I was working at one of the many jobs I had held over the years, and we quickly became friends because we both loved music. Steve had never been married and had his own house in a nice neighborhood. We had a blast going to the gym to work out together and we both loved to play guitar and write songs, but I could not be without a woman for long. I went back on Plenty of Fish and started the cycle again. I wasn’t on the dating site two months before I met a single mother closer to my age who had three boys. I knew right away that I had struck gold. Cindy and I started dating, and a few weeks later I loaded up my Pontiac G5 with all my earthly belongings and moved in.

For a change I made a choice that had little to do with my libido or my need to rescue. I enjoyed thinking and communicating on the same level as this woman and being at the same place in life. Without a doubt she was the best choice I had ever made, and her desire to grow made it even better. Her maturity and life experience made me feel unbelievably safe considering all I had gone through with Rachel. The biggest difference between this relationship and those that preceded it was that she seemed to see only the good in me, which I was sure would not last very long. Moving in with Cindy was an almost seamless transition, and there were never any drama-filled days.

Cindy was a single mother of three boys. The oldest, Justin, had already moved out of the house, so there was just Hunter and Nicholas who were both good boys. We all lived very well together and I immediately felt like a father figure to the boys. It was obvious that we had something special that neither of us had ever experienced.

I was trying to build websites full-time, but the work had really slowed down, which meant I had issues with money again. Cindy told me she wanted me to get a real job or she couldn’t move forward in the relationship. I did not want to mess this one up, because I was actually myself 100% of the time, and she hadn't left me, so I took a job as a salesman for a direct mail company making a guaranteed salary of $32,000 per year.

My chances of making much more than that were slim, as it was a very difficult product to sell. I gave it everything I had, though, and at least had work that was consistent. I knew I had to prove that I could do it.

Nevertheless, Cindy could tell that I was not happy. I was feeling hopeless and depressed and knew she wouldn’t put up with me much longer. I never had to borrow money from her, but there were times when I was not able to help her with the bills to the extent I wanted. Here I was, about to turn forty-three, with three failed marriages, countless failed jobs, living with yet another woman with whom I had jumped into a relationship, and every earthly possession I had could fit into the backseat of my Pontiac G5. When was I going to get it right? I just didn’t see the purpose in life anymore. I found myself praying occasionally that God would just take me home.

22 The Cycle Ends and Life Begins

In February 2011, the biggest ice storm on record hit Dallas-Fort Worth. On the first night that we could get out of our driveway, my oldest daughter Ashley and Cindy’s oldest son Justin came over to visit and play games. I started having difficulty breathing, much like the experience I'd had when I was with Regina. I thought it was because I had been smoking outside in the extreme cold. Even though I had smoked most of the time since I was nineteen, this had never happened before. I thought maybe it was the combination of smoking and below-freezing temperatures and told them I was going to lie down.

My breathing became more and more difficult. I began coughing, and fluid was filling my lungs. I was coughing up fluid, then fluid mixed with blood. I thought I must have pneumonia or bronchitis, so I went back to the living room and asked Cindy to Google “coughing up blood.”

She said, “You are going to the hospital!” and made me get in the car.

Cindy and Ashley helped me into the car, and Cindy navigated the very icy roads to the hospital. I wasn’t feeling extremely bad, just having a hard time breathing because of the fluid on my lungs. In the emergency room, the doctor who did the X-rays determined that it must be pneumonia and admitted me to the hospital. Once I was settled in, Cindy and Ashley returned home.

I continued to have difficulty breathing. A few hours later, after I was moved to my room for the night, the doctors put me on a breathing treatment where I had to wear a mask over my nose and mouth so that I could inhale the medicine. The treatment caused my heart to speed up and it sent me into a panic. I ripped off the mask and asked for straight oxygen.

The attending doctor acted confused. “This doesn’t look like pneumonia to me. You don’t have a fever, and you aren’t feeling sick. We would like to do more tests.”

I agreed, so they drew more blood and left the room. What seemed like only a moment later she returned looking white as a ghost. I could tell that the new data must not have been good. I will never forget the drawn look on her face. I could tell she was trying not to worry me, but clearly she had some bad news to deliver.

“Mr. Hill," she said. "Can you call your family and have them come back to the hospital?”

I was confused and asked why I should call them.

“Our tests came back, and this is not pneumonia. It's your heart, and we need to take you to ICU for more tests. You need to call your family and have them come back up here.”

This confused me further. I called Cindy and told her they could come if they wanted to, but that the doctors were going to run tests, and I would not be available to see them. The oxygen was helping my breathing, so I was beginning to feel better. I lay there and watched as everyone rushed around outside my room.

One of the nurses asked the doctor, “Don’t you have to get permission from someone to move him to ICU?”

The doctor responded, “Not in this case. He’s tombstone.”

What? She had no idea I had heard what she said, but I couldn’t believe I was that close to death! Tombstone? It didn’t take a genius to figure out what that meant.

They moved me onto a gurney and started rolling me to ICU. I was feeling no pain and could not believe the sadness and fear I saw on everyone’s face. When I made eye contact, they would force a concerned smile. One of the nurses had her hands clasped and held up to her face as if she was praying and preparing herself for what was about to take place.

As the surgical staff prepared me for the cardiologist and his team, other nurses and aids gathered in a room inside the operating room that had a glass wall designed for close observation. They gave me a smile of encouragement when I glanced over at them. I felt that no one wanted to leave. Because of the icy streets, it would be another hour before the whole team arrived to get started on me. It was evident that the situation was grave, but I was at perfect peace and in no pain at all.

I lay on the table resting while we waited for the cardiologist to arrive. It was quiet and peaceful and I was thinking to myself that if this is dying, it isn’t that bad. I was thinking that I could just slip off and leave this world, and leave all its misery behind.

About that time a powerful feeling came over me, a feeling that I had felt only a few times before. There was a powerful presence, accompanied by a message. The message came across calmly and clearly. I knew it was from God.

God’s still, small voice simply asked a question. “Well, John, do you want to stay, or do you want to go?”

It kind of shocked me, but I started thinking about it. I knew that whatever I chose was what God was going to give me. I began thinking over my life and remembered all the failures and how many times I wanted to be taken off this planet. Here was my golden opportunity!

However, a part of me also believed that my life was something God was going to use for great things and I couldn’t shake that feeling. I felt the peace of the other side and was ready to go, so I knew that if I chose to stay it would only be for one reason, and that reason was to be used by God to do His will concerning other people. I wanted to be selfish, but there was something bigger driving me to choose to stay.

I thought long and hard before I spoke to God. Finally I said, “I would like to stay, if that’s okay. But I have some things I want to ask of you."

I had put a lot of thought into what I was going to say. I carefully presented my three requests, not knowing that these three requests would shape my life.

“I want to be remembered for doing something good.” Up to this point very few people would remember much about me. I was a nice guy, but as far as I knew I had done nothing of great value for anyone else.

“I want to live every day of the rest of my life, not just be alive.” I had spent so much time taking life for granted and not appreciating the gifts that He gave me every day that I had never really lived.

“I want to touch as many people as I can while I am on this Earth." For so many years I had been self-centered and worked hard to seek out things that would make me feel good. I felt there were very few people I had touched in a positive way.

God spoke immediately, in a firm, powerful voice that sounded almost excited to me. “So be it!"

I felt a shock from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet, and I knew that everything was going to be just fine.

The cardiologist and his team began doing their work. The doctor lectured me about smoking and my bad eating habits, as he had determined that I had two major arteries that were blocked. One was blocked 100%, and the other was 99%. Blood had not flowed to a portion of my heart for an undetermined amount of time. He wasn’t sure if he would be able to fix it with stents, which meant he might have to perform emergency open heart surgery.

At this point I wasn’t concerned at all. I told him to do what he needed do. I was awake the entire time and watched on a monitor hanging above the bed as he navigated the arteries. He placed three stents and then inserted dye back through my heart to see if the stents were in place. Immediately we saw my heart fill with the dye, which spread through the previously blocked arteries. Everyone behind the glass was clapping and whooping and hollering. I was alive and it was a miracle.

The doctor explained to me that I had experienced a massive heart attack and that there was a part of my heart that was dead and would never function again. I stayed a few more days in the hospital and was able to recover enough to be sent home.

Part 2

A Life with Purpose

23 Broke, and Broken

Once I was released from the hospital, I didn’t wait long to get started with my new life. First line of business was to stop living with my girlfriend Cindy. If I wasn’t going to be committed for life, then I needed to move on. So we got married.

Cindy made the suggestion, and I was ready. She proposed to me in the most romantic way. “John, you don’t have insurance, and if we get married I can add you to mine immediately.”

How could I resist? My first week out of the hospital I was standing in front of the Justice of the Peace, saying “I do” once again. I had been married in churches before and we know how those turned out. So why not be married by someone who actually had the word “peace” in their title? Made sense to me.

Cindy was now tied to me forever, although at that moment it didn’t seem like it would be very long. My heart attack was severe and had seriously damaged my heart, so there was a good chance that I would not be around long enough to get another divorce. However, my moments with God in the ICU kept me believing that I would be around at least long enough to do something good.

Even with this new lease on life, it didn’t take long to get sucked back into my old ways of thinking. I began reading about people who had had heart attacks and how they coped with things. I read about the odds of survival after a heart attack. My mind wandered back and forth between “I know I have purpose” and “Oh, I think I feel my heart stopping.” Fear gripped me at times, while other times I would allow the peace of knowing I was still breathing and not in absolute control to overcome the fear. I figured I would die young, just like Rick, since our lives had so many commonalities and I had obviously inherited the heart condition that ended his life. I would find myself thinking, “What now? Where do I go? What do I do? How can I be used now? I am not only broke, but broken.”

I finally relaxed and tended to my second request to God. I was going to focus on living versus just being alive. The only way that seemed right to me was to simply be thankful for what I had in my life right now and cherish even the so-called bad things. If God was in control and He allowed me to stay around, then shouldn’t I trust Him to use every situation in my life to guide me to His ultimate purpose?

With the prospect of being removed from the planet at any moment hanging over my head, my options were clear. Either I could relax and let God do His thing in me, or I could stress out over not really knowing what the future held. Stressing out is not living and it is not trusting, so I held onto the knowledge that God was in control and the only reason I was still here was that He had a purpose for me.

Before I go much further, I think it is important to say that I was in a very strange place in my walk with God. I had complete faith in God, but to be honest, I was in a “desert” place and very confused about who God was. I just knew that He existed and that I could trust Him to bring me to the place I needed to be. I wasn’t even sure I was a Christian.

I want you to know that, because I want you to understand that seeking God is not always about having the right answers first. Do you have a love for God, but have so many questions that you hold your heart back from Him? Maybe God has brought you to this desert place so you can truly seek Him rather than try to fit in with what or who you thought He was.

That is the difference between relationship and religion. Relationship guides you into a deeper understanding and knowledge of someone through connection, while religion forces you into a pattern of doing. It’s the difference between loving someone so much that you honor their feelings, and being a slave to someone who will hurt you if you don’t do what they want you to do. Finding the path of a loving relationship far exceeds the power of the whip.

Unfortunately, most people think you need to have all the answers or at least buy into the story of Jesus before you can seek God. God knows just how little you know and you aren’t fooling God, so just resign yourself to the truth that you can’t grasp in your

82 mind who God is and that you may never understand everything that the church presents to you. God loves you more than you can understand love, and if you will just rest in Him, He will teach you and lead you to a wonderful place where doubts in His ability and desire to create good in your life will fade away.

24 My Path to the Desert

In the first part of this book you got to experience the roller coaster of my up-and-down journey with God and see the big picture of what it looks like to come to the end of the ride. I am not so prideful to think that I can’t go another round on the roller coaster, especially knowing my human frailty, but right now God has done some amazing things in my life and I feel confident that He has moved me into a different place. The Bible has many stories of how God allowed men to come to the end of themselves and then moved them into a different place.

Now that we have come to this part of my story, I find it necessary to digress and walk you through my path to the desert. How could someone so passionate about Jesus and the church become so lost? How could I doubt that I was even a Christian after all the sermons, all the amazing moves of God in my life, and Him saving my life and filling me with purpose?

Many years back, when I was with my third wife, Rachel, I was very active in my local church. I spent hours a day in prayer seeking God as passionately as I could. I would get up at 5:00 a.m. and use the time between 5:00 and 7:00 a.m. to be alone with the one thing that meant the most to me. I thought I was near the pinnacle of Christendom and was proud of where I was headed. My wife and I were on the front pew sitting next to the pastor every Sunday, and we had a thriving jail ministry. I was on my way up the pastoral ladder and could see that I was only a few steps away from going into full-time ministry. I thought this was what God had planned for me.

My prayer was not to be a leader in the church, but to do God’s will and have the closest relationship possible to my creator. I assumed that my path at that time was what God willed for my life. I spent hours petitioning God to let me know Him in a deeper way, to show me how to love more deeply than anyone has ever loved, and to give me clear direction and do only what He told me to do. As with all my prayers, it seemed God took them seriously, but He didn't do what I thought He was going to do. I thought His plan was for me to work my way to full-time ministry in the church, like others I had considered ministers, but God had different plans.

25 I Had a Dream

When Rachel and I had been married four years, our walk with God was getting stronger. We were ministering and getting more involved in church, but both of us began to feel like something was about to change. We didn’t know what it was, but God was impressing on both of us that something was about to happen.

Then I had a dream. In all my seeking, and through all the miraculous moves God had made in my life, it was a dream that would initiate a journey I never expected to take, not in a million years. It was the kind of dream that I knew was a message from God, and it shook me deeply. Most dreams I can remember in bits and pieces, but this dream was vivid from beginning to end. It would be what I thought about when I lost my way through the coming years.

I am in boot camp, standing alongside many other soldiers in basic training with a burning in my spirit to break loose from the group. I have somewhere else I am supposed to go, but I don’t understand why. So I break away from the formation, and several others break away with me. They are laughing nervously as we run further and further away from the group.

Eventually I look back and see that everyone else has chosen to return in fear of getting in trouble. I have a mission to accomplish and know it isn’t going to be by following the rules. So I continue my journey over walls and obstacles till I reach a stadium.

I enter the stadium and notice my youngest daughter’s elementary class sitting in the stands. I wonder if this is where I am supposed to be, so I make my way to her class and the teacher walks over and begins talking to me. I'm not paying much attention to what she is saying, because I feel like I need to go and keep on moving. So I say goodbye and continue through to the other side of the stadium.

I make my way to the opposite side and am walking down the concrete tunnel that usually exits big stadiums and notice a lady with short blonde hair standing just outside what seems to be an office door. She says, “Follow me.”

I enter the door following her and realize that I am in a lounge area for the officers and leaders of the boot camp. All the leaders are standing around and I feel I need to impress them with my marching skills, so I march through the lounge area and awkwardly find myself tripping on a bottle and making a fool of myself. None of the leaders act like I am in the room and ignore me.

Finally I see that the lady is waiting patiently for me to stop trying to impress them, and I realize that I don’t need to impress them. I continue to follow her down the hall where there is a row of telephone booths. When you are in boot camp, it is a privilege you have to earn to be able to use the phones. I think to myself, “Am I going to be rewarded for my rebellious behavior?”

She goes right past the row of phone booths and opens a strange door. This door is like nothing I had ever seen. It does not have hinges on the sides, rather, a rod going through the middle of the door so that the door would spin top to bottom. The lady has to balance the door at the halfway point so that I can crawl under. Once we enter through the door, we are both standing against the back wall of what looks like a special operations training facility. There is a teacher at the front of the room drawing on a chalk board and a group of mean-looking soldiers sitting along the wall to my left listening to their instructor.

The lady speaks to me. “In this room is a mighty warrior.” I scan the faces of the men that line the wall, trying to determine which of them could be the mighty warrior she is talking about. They all look really tough and are decked out in battle gear from head to toe. They look as if they have been in battle for years; their faces are dirty and they have war paint smeared under their eyes.

Just as I think I have figured out which one of them must be the mighty warrior, the instructor picks up a machine gun and starts blasting them away with such force that the wall caves in on top of them. He then turns and starts walking toward me. Amazingly I am not afraid of him and feel quite at peace as he takes my arm. I follow him out of the room.

Immediately we are in a small airplane that he is piloting. I am sitting at an open door like you see in movies on helicopters. As we are flying, orbs that resemble jellyfish are being launched at the plane. As one nears the plane, I hit it away with the palm of my hands. They start coming very quickly and my hands instinctively knock them away. I

am the plane’s defense system, and I realize that I am not the one controlling my arms. I look up at the pilot, and he smiles at me as I realize that he is the one who is working through me to protect the plane.

I didn’t understand the entire dream at the time it occurred. Parts made sense and seemed apparent. It seemed that I would be venturing on my own and eventually would be directed by someone. I could even see that at the end I would be used in some way. What I didn’t know is how it was going to unfold.

I shared it with other people hoping that an interpretation would present itself. The only thing anyone said that I thought was interesting--but also a bit shocking--was that I was the mighty warrior in the room. Me, a mighty warrior? I thought it must mean I was going to move up in ministry.

26 Living Out the Dream

The more I prayed to know God and for Him to open my heart to do whatever He told me to do, the more I received in my spirit that I was supposed to give up my jail ministry and leave the church that I was so immersed in. I couldn’t shake it, and I prayed and fasted about it. After all, I had earned the respect of the congregation, I had obligations, and I was on my way to being a real minister like the pastor and many other leaders that I aspired to imitate.

Why would God make me leave the church where I was doing so much good? I reasoned that it must be Satan trying to keep me from doing God’s work. I was able to get many of my Christian friends to agree with me, including the pastor. They told me that God wouldn’t take me out of church unless He had some other church that he wanted me to go to. I agreed and continued to pray and rebuke the devil for trying to trick me into leaving the ministry.

However, it didn’t take long before the burning in my soul was too much to bear. I continued to petition God and begged Him to give me a clear and distinct direction. I kept feeling deeply that I was supposed to leave where I was and I was not supposed to seek another church. I argued with God about what I was feeling and told Him that He would never tell me to leave church without another church to go to.

Like times before, I felt God speak to me directly. “Hebrews 11:8.”

I scrambled for my Bible and looked up the verse. I have read the Bible many times and studied it, but I was definitely not the guy who could quote scriptures and tell you where they were in the Bible. So I did not have a clue about what I was about to read. “By faith, Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going."

I thought, “Oh, no.” It didn’t get much clearer than that.

However, I still fought Him, reasoning that maybe he would tell me where I needed to go after I obeyed Him. Despite the clear guidance I had been given, it was not enough to make me give up what I was doing. I just could not make a decision of this magnitude that would take me back to square one in my quest for ministry. I again prayed and fasted for clear direction, knowing inside I was supposed to leave. The battle in my soul was excruciating and I finally said, “God, show me one place in the Bible where you tell someone not go to church!”

I thought I had one over on Him. I had read the Bible several times, sat through countless sermons, and was absolutely sure that there was not a scripture in the Bible that said, “Don’t go to church.”

He spoke to my heart very clearly the word “Amos.” So I picked up my Bible and began reading the book of Amos. After reading several chapters and not seeing anything that resembled what I had asked God to show me, I was about to stop reading, but I felt urged to continue. In the fifth chapter, I read the words that confirmed to me that I had a different mission than what I had assumed.

Amos 5: 4-6. For thus says the Lord to the house of Israel: “Seek Me and live. But do not seek Bethel, nor enter Gilgal, nor pass over to Beersheba; for Gilgal shall surely go into captivity, and Bethel shall come to nothing. Seek the Lord and live, lest He break out like fire in the house of Joseph, and devour it, with no one to quench it in Bethel."

That may sound like gibberish, but Bethel means “House of God,” or what we consider church, and Gilgal (remember my previous experience with the word Gilgal?) was where the Israelites would go to do their sacrifices, or in other words “church.” This scripture clearly stated, “Do not seek the church or even go to the place where you give your sacrifices.”

It was as clear as anyone could possibly direct me verbally that I was supposed to seek Him and Him alone and separate myself from what I knew as the “right” way to be a Christian. I was supposed to leave the church.

I have asked myself many times why God wanted me to leave the church, especially since I fell further away from God after I left. I didn’t go on a missionary trip or do great

89 works for Him. It was quite the opposite. My marriage fell apart, I got drawn back into the same patterns I went through before with women, and I lost sight of doing anything for the church. I found myself asking questions that caused me to question Christianity altogether.

I have reasoned over and over in my mind that I had to have been duped by the devil. That it couldn’t have been God, because if it were God, wouldn’t I have become even more passionate about serving Him and doing ministry? Instead I was stripped to the bone spiritually and I became what most Christians would consider as lost. I didn’t become a better Christian by listening to Him, I became a broken and lost wanderer, seeking something I now did not understand. Without the church, without all the answers, I was now having to find my way without a map.

However, even in my falling away, I talked to God on a daily basis. I still felt like He had control and the one thing that I was able to cling to through the years was that I had faith that God was going to do with me what He will. I wasn’t living my life the right way, but my heart was still screaming, “God, show me what I am supposed to do. I will do anything you direct me to do!”

I felt much like a clay pot that was being crushed to its base material. My mind no longer had answers. I was returned to dust with only the knowledge that I trusted God to mold and shape my life. It would have to be Him who added the water to return me to clay. It would be Him who took my life and shaped it into the vessel He wanted me to be. It was and will always be my job to do and say what I believe God wants me to do and say, even if it isn’t popular in the mainstream religious community or in the world. In my dream, I was to venture away from what was organized and spend some time wandering. I figured that the first part of the dream was about to happen.

27 Moses and Me

I love the story of Moses, which for me explains where I think God has me spiritually. Moses was chosen to be saved by God from his birth. The Hebrew people were growing in number and Pharaoh was in fear that they would try to overtake the Egyptians, so he made a proclamation that all newborn Hebrew boys would be put to death. Moses’ mother hid him from Pharaoh’s henchmen and sent him floating down the river in a basket. As the story goes, he was found by Pharaoh’s daughter and raised as royalty.

I can’t help but see the similarity in my biological mother hiding me so that I would not be killed. She sent me down a path that led to my adoption. I was spared for a purpose. Although I don’t think I will be splitting the Red Sea, I do believe I was spared to bring a message of deliverance to God’s people, which is all people.

Although scripture doesn't say if Moses understood his future calling, it was apparent that he cared about his people. One day he saw a slave-master beating an Israelite slave and Moses killed the man. It seems it was in him to see his brethren freed from tyranny, and he tried to do what was within his power to do with no concern for the consequences. The whistle was blown on him, and Moses hightailed it out of Egypt. He left the life he had known and was reduced from sitting in the royal court to being a sheep farmer.

What happened? Why did God set him up like that? He spared him as a child, gave him everything he could possibly want, and yet Moses found himself on the run for his life. Wouldn’t he be able to do more for the people if he continued his life as royalty? Why would God allow Moses to rise to such a high position, then get caught doing something that would ruin his position? I imagine Moses felt lost and out of place. He was trying to do good by protecting his people. Now he was a nobody, an outcast, a failure.

I don’t know what happened in those forty years Moses spent as a sheep farmer, but it had to be hard for him. He went from being a royal palace prince to what the Bible

91 states in Numbers 12:3, “a very humble man, more humble than anyone else on the face of the earth."

Perhaps something dramatic had to happen in order for Moses to become this humble man. I think that God must have crushed him to fine powder and shaken him to the core, to the point that Moses forgot everything he had known and realized he had no control over his circumstances. Moses learned to live each day the best he knew how, so that if God were to use him, it would be on God’s terms and in God’s way.

According to the Bible, one day as Moses was tending the sheep, he saw a bush that seemed to be on fire, yet the bush was not being consumed by the fire. As he drew near the bush, he heard the voice of God instructing him as to what he was supposed to do next: free the nation of Israel.

Can you imagine what was going through Moses’ mind? “What? I’m old! I don’t have the strength to free an entire nation. I have so many shortcomings and faults. Who am I to bring the children of Israel out of Egypt?”

Then God spoke the words that would give him the courage to follow through. “I will certainly be with you.” God assured Moses that eventually he, Moses, would be standing in that very spot on Mount Horeb with the whole nation of Israel standing with him.

How beautiful it is to know that God cares about our lives so much that he saves us from ourselves! The moment we think we know something and have all the answers, God proves to us that we don’t have the control we thought we did. We don’t know all the answers and yet we spend our lives trying to convince people that we do.

Can you imagine what your life could be like if you could allow yourself to be honest about how truly in the dark you are, stripped to the point that the only way you will move is when God reveals His plan for you? That is why I think God led me away from church. I believe He needed me to ask the questions that would bring me to the point of realizing that I didn’t have the answers. My task was to depend on Him completely to lead me to where He wanted me to go.

28 Obedience and the Unforeseen Path

Our walking away from the church in obedience to God did not skyrocket Rachel and me into a thriving ministry. Things went in the opposite direction, and we both fell away from God. We eventually got divorced, and I fell back into the old patterns of seeking companionship. This time my falling away was much worse than any time before, because it wasn’t just me falling away from God and sinning. It was accompanied by the difficult question, “Why did God lead me to a place where I would fall away?”

The times when I fell before, I could blame myself for my weakness, but this time I felt I could blame God for removing me from church and the support system that kept me in line. I started questioning myself about God and who He is. Did I really hear God speak, or was my mind playing tricks on me? Why did I choose to believe in Jesus in the first place? Could God be bigger than what I learned in church? Could all religions be talking about the same God, and He wanted me to get away from church so He could “enlighten” me?

My questions resulted in one resounding echo through my soul. Three words consumed me and also became my freedom. With all my dealings with God, with all the teachings and sermons, with everything I had in my head, the only answer was, “I don't know!"

Is Jesus the way? I don’t know. Is the Bible the true word of God? I don’t know. Am I saved? I don’t know. Is there really a hell or heaven? I don’t know. Will God ever use me? I don’t know. My mind was pulverized into not knowing anything. I didn’t have any answers. Nothing made sense and I became completely void of understanding.

There was only one thing left. I knew there was a God, not with my mind, but from a different place in me, from my spirit. There was something much deeper telling me that God loves me and wants me to know Him. I couldn’t deny that I was unsure about my salvation, nor could I be certain that Jesus was who the Bible says He is. Yet I knew that if it were true that God loves me, I would eventually find my way back to Him.

All I knew was that I would have to take a different path. My mind couldn’t take me there, because I had already introduced too many questions. I had asked myself questions that I couldn’t answer. Nor could any Christian answer them in a way that would make me believe and understand. It reminded me of my dream and, because the Lord showed me that I would end up being used by Him, I felt secure that I would make it to my destination even though I didn’t have a clue where I was going in my life.

29 Two Questions No One Could Answer

I want to share with you two of the questions that shattered my mind. If you don’t want to go there with me, then this is where you should probably stop reading, because no matter how hard you try, the perfect answer will not come. Really thinking about these questions could make you doubt your faith and threaten your identity. It may make you question the very heart of God and everything you thought you knew. I will tell you that there is an answer that I will share with you later that I have accepted, but I must take you through this valley with me first.

The first question involves the character of God. I believe that many people have this question, but push it out of their consciousness. I encourage you to ponder this question, but do not allow yourself to draw a conclusion, because truly only God knows all the answers. This will be between you and God.

Question 1: If God is all knowing and all loving, why would He create humanity, knowing that the majority of His creation would end up spending an eternity in conscious torment (hell) with no chance of reconciliation, based solely on what they believe in their short span on earth?

I have heard many times that even church folks could end up in hell. Heaven is not reserved for everyone who claims to be a Christian, but for the real Christians who have the right answers. According to many churches, only Christians who have unwavering faith in the complete truth as taught by that church, without any doubts about the Bible and its teachings, will go to heaven.

The problem I ran into was I’m not sure which denomination has the whole truth. There are many interpretations of the truth, but they can’t all be right, can they? One denomination believes that once you are saved you are always saved; another believes that you must speak in tongues as evidence that you have the Holy Spirit. Others believe that in order to be saved you must be baptized in the name of Jesus or you really weren’t saved. Each denomination has its own interpretation and emphasis, and it is up to us to determine which one is right.

All I know is that, according to the Christianity taught in most churches, those who don’t have the right answer will be lost and damned forever to hell. That is pretty serious, so knowing the exact route to avoid hell should be clear to us, right? At what point did you actually become saved? When did you do the right thing to change your eternal outcome? When did you actually believe the right thing? Was it when you said the prayer of salvation? When you went in front of the church and made it public? When you got baptized? What if after all those things you still had doubts? If you have a doubt does it mean you lost your salvation or were never saved in the first place? The salvation has to be “right” or you will end up in hell. You better know for sure that you are saved, because you could end up in eternal torture if you didn’t do it right.

Would someone who is all knowing and all loving create this system? If so, that would mean God created us knowing that the overwhelming majority of His creation would end up in misery and torture for eternity. Does that make sense at all? Doesn’t it seem a little unfair since we didn’t have a choice about being born or not?

I have to shake my head when I think that anyone can boldly and conclusively answer that question. However, there has been no lack of trying. To explain things they don’t understand, some will use a Biblical answer like “God’s ways are not our ways, so who am I to question why God would choose to send people to eternal conscious torture?” which sounds really spiritual.

I have to answer, as a person full of faults and far from perfection, “Really? That was the best way?”

Think about it. If you, far from godly perfection, knew that you were about to create the next Charles Manson or Hitler, would you do everything in your power to not create this monster, or would you create it anyway? This, of course, is a small thing in comparison to purposely creating the monster and then also creating a place to torture the monster for eternity. Now add to the mix that not only does the monster go to this place of eternal torture, but also the ones who were wonderful people on Earth and sought God with their whole heart, but did not believe without a shadow of doubt in one certain element of the belief system.

Some Christians would say that we all deserve hell, but God saw fit to provide us a savior so we could be saved from hell. If we just believe in Him and accept Him as our savior, then we will be saved from the hell that we deserve.

Yet I have to ask, what did we do to deserve hell? I understand that we are all sinners and fall short of the glory of God, but we didn’t ask to be created and our birth was out of our control. Why would being born in a time where there was no Bible or into a community that practices another religion make me deserving of eternal conscious torture? How is it fair that one of my ancestors ate the wrong fruit and now I am deserving of hell? What kind of God would come up with that plan? Has God purposely tied His hands and allowed Himself to be forced to watch the creation that He loves wrench in everlasting torture? He sees all things and can see His children in hell. How can a Father of love shrug His shoulders and do nothing about all of those who didn’t believe or didn’t believe the right way?

I challenge you to try and find love in eternal conscious torture. Remember, according to what we are taught in many churches, hell is forever. It isn’t a place where we learn a lesson and end up reformed. It is for eternity. How can you answer this question, and God come out on the other end unscathed? How can you come to the conclusion that this is a loving plan? Why would you want to believe in a God that would come up with that plan? Does any of this sound like the God you know in your spirit?

Question 2: If the Bible is the absolute Word of God, then which version is the “right” one and who has the authority to call it the absolute Word of God?

According to Wikipedia there are approximately 41,000 Christian denominations worldwide, with wide and varying interpretations of scripture. As well, the Bible has been translated into 518 languages, with nearly one hundred complete versions or translations in English. With that many variations, we can only reason that there is imperfection when it comes to the Bible. Perfect is perfect. There is no variation in perfect. Every word would represent exactly what it means and would not need to be changed in order to increase our understanding.

It amazes me that if we were holding the very words of God in our hands, that we would be okay with different versions. Wouldn’t every word be significant? Yet, most

97 of us are satisfied that there are hundreds of versions of the Bible, never questioning the fact that so many people interpret the Bible in so many different ways.

How can we be sure the Bible is absolute truth? If the Bible is not 100% accurate, then what is the largest religious movement of all time built upon? There were thousands of scriptures that didn’t make it into the Bible we read today. Who has the authority to determine what is holy and what is not? We know that many men, each with his own opinion, were involved in writing and assembling what we consider the “absolute” Word of God. Right? We do understand that the words in red in our Bible were not written by Jesus himself and were greatly influenced by Judaism and particularly the men who wrote the words…right?

30 Inspired by God

I know these questions may not sit well with some people, because it is the basis of our identity. If the Bible isn’t perfect, then their relationship with God could be wrong. It has to be black or white for those who need an error-free rule book in order to prove their identity. Eternal security is at stake here, so we must, without reservation, believe every word in the Bible. That is what most Christians think they must believe to be a “real” Christian.

Many have been taught that the Bible is as holy as God Himself. I remember as a child setting a glass of milk on the big family Bible. My grandmother just about had a heart attack and told me that I was never to put something on top of a Bible. I thought that I was about to be struck by lightning.

The Bible is a collection of writings that were inspired by God, right? Here are four versions of the first few words of 2 Timothy 3:16. Notice how the verse begins.

 All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful... (New International Version)

 All scripture is inspired by God and is useful… (New Living Translation)

 Every writing ‘which is written by The Spirit’ is profitable… (Aramaic Bible in Plain

English)

 Every scripture inspired by God is also profitable… (English Revised Version)

Look closely at how these different versions present one scripture. The first two make the statement that all scripture is inspired by God while the latter two say in essence that only those scriptures that ARE inspired by God are useful or profitable. That may not seem like much of a difference, but the difference is like day and night. If every written word that is inspired by God is profitable, then there are many more scriptures inspired by God that were not included in the one book, the Bible. However, if Paul is talking about every scripture from one specific book and nothing more, then he is not

99 including anything that he wrote himself or that anyone else wrote beyond the Old Testament.

Here is yet another version that supports that all writing inspired by God is useful:

Every scripture inspired of God is also profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for instruction which is in righteousness (2 Timothy 3:16, American Standard Version).

When Paul was writing Timothy and said that all scripture is God-breathed or inspired, what scripture was he talking about? Do you think he was talking about our current Bible? Do you think Paul walked around with a leather-bound book that included his letters to the churches he fathered and taught people to only believe those scriptures? Did he have the writings of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John? How about Revelation? Did Paul even have a clue that one day his letters would be considered scripture? So what book held these scriptures that he was talking about? I think it is a far stretch to think that he was seeing into the future and was talking about the Bible we know, yet Christians limit scripture to mean the Bible. Could it be possible that there are many God inspired writings out there that are truly God’s Word that isn’t in the Bible? Could Paul be pointing out that it is possible for men to be inspired by God and share something that would bring man closer to God? If we can believe that God can inspire any man to write something that would feed our Spirit, then can it also be possible that there are things that did not make it into the Bible that was inspired by God?

With man assembling something, do you think it could be possible that there are imperfections or at the very least something could be potentially missing?

It’s Time to Come Clean

Some of you may be wondering at this point why I have decided to share these questions and thoughts. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done and it hurts my heart to think that someone would be offended. I didn’t want to say anything that would make me look like a false teacher or that would make people think that I would attempt to lead someone astray. However, I had to do what I believe God wanted me to do, even if it made me look really bad to some of you. So now, I have to come clean and share why I did it. It wasn’t to convince you to believe the Bible isn’t perfect or that hell

100 isn’t real. It is to show you how it looks to be in the brain of someone like me. There are millions of people like me that are turned off by confident Christians who have no problem telling someone what they should believe to be a Christian. When someone has questions that are difficult to answer, most will try to answer those questions with what they understand with their mind. I have had Christians get angry at me when I would ask them questions like this and I would hear things like “you just have to believe!” and all I could say is “Why?” They would then say something like, “Well, because the Bible is the Word of God and if you don’t believe it then you are calling God a liar!” Those kind of responses made me truly believe that there was no way I could be a real Christian, even after all the amazing things Jesus did in my life. Not only did I have to deal with my own personal failures, but I also couldn’t see how I would ever get back to Jesus. I became lost.

Do you know someone who is lost? Are you lost? The answer isn’t believing everything you have been told or read in the Bible, it is knowing that Jesus loves you and died for you and wants to have a relationship with you. Do you know deep down that Jesus is real and He loves you and you want that relationship with Him too? Then forget everything else you think you need to know, you have all you need and Jesus can take you to places you never thought were possible. You may never have all the answers, but you can have confidence that you are saved if you put your trust in what Jesus has already done.

If you are lucky enough to be one of the confident Christians with perfect faith and no questions, then I hope that you can now understand what someone like me goes through. If you have a friend that seems to be always challenging you about the Bible or seems angry at you when you try to share your faith, realize that they are seeking and they are more than likely frustrated that someone can’t give them an answer that will make them see the light. They can’t see the light, because the answer isn’t in book knowledge. That person needs to see the grace and love of Jesus, not to be told they are wrong for questioning. I was fortunate enough to know that my life was spared and I knew that God had a plan, so I was able to accept where I was and fully trust God to get me to where He wanted me to go. I hope sharing my messed up life will help others find their way to that place.

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31 The Idea That Changed My Life

The months following my release from the hospital did not seem filled with miraculous occurrences, but I had much more faith that God had a purpose for me and that someday that purpose would unfold. I wasn’t afraid to die and I knew that every moment was a gift from my Heavenly Father. This assurance removed most of the stress from my life so that I was able to let God do what He wanted to do and didn’t concern myself with trying to impress anyone. I simply continued to live and work and try to provide for my family.

I was selling direct mail advertising for a company called Money Mailer, which was an envelope full of ads and coupons mailed to homeowners. The fee for the client was $800 per month to cover the 20,000 homes in Mansfield, Texas. I occasionally built websites in my off time, which brought in a little extra money, but the websites were too few and far between to make a living at it.

One day as I was talking to a local plumber about being in the Money Mailer envelope, he posed a question that would alter my thinking from then on. He said that he didn’t have the money to pay for it by himself, but that he knew a great electrician and a great local roofer whom he trusted enough to tie his name to. He asked, “Could we share an ad and split the cost?”

My knowledge of advertising told me that it would be too confusing to put multiple ads on one piece. I told him I doubted if it would work, but to let me think about it. How could I put multiple contractors together and split the cost of advertising? I thought to myself that I could build a website that had one plumber, one electrician, one roofer, etc., and since there would be no competition, then I could use their money to pay for one ad for Mansfield Money Mailer. At this time I was only thinking about how to sell an ad for my employer.

The idea evolved very quickly in my mind, and I thought that I could use my website- building and marketing skills to create an income, versus building the website for free so I could get a sale for Money Mailer. The thought consumed me and I knew that I

102 needed to give it a try, but what would I do about my paying job? I was in outside sales so I could easily see if I could sell my idea while I was out and about. However, what kind of integrity would I have if I used the time I was getting paid to sell Money Mailer to try and sell something else?

It was clear that it was not right to try to sell my idea while working for Money Mailer, so I walked into the owner’s office and told him I needed to resign. I told him that I had an idea and couldn’t give my full attention to it while working at Money Mailer. He thought I was crazy but appreciated me for not wasting his money and wished me the best.

I walked out the door with nothing in the bank and without a clue if my idea would work or how to run a business. I stepped out in faith and believed with all my heart that I had made the right move.

I decided to call it Mansfield Service Connection and began talking to contractors about securing their spot as the exclusive contractor in their field. I charged a one-time fee of $1000 to secure their spot and they agreed to a future rate of $100 per month once I got enough different contractors together to begin advertising them as a group. What I realized right away was that the good contractors already knew other good contractors from different fields of service that they had worked alongside for years. So, through referrals from the good guys, it only took me six weeks to assemble fifteen different services that were willing to pay the one-time fee in order to lock in their exclusive position and the monthly fee to advertise the group in Mansfield. I had brought in $15,000 from this one website and would be managing a $1500 per month budget for the contractors. With $1500 per month I would be able to advertise the group in a few local publications.

I made the mistake of sharing my ideas with a man I didn't know very well and learned a very valuable lesson. When I went to buy the domain names for the next couple of towns where I thought I would build the service, someone else had already purchased the names. I never knew for sure if it was this man, but it didn’t matter. It made me angry at first, but it was probably the single most important lesson I learned moving forward. From this experience I learned that I shouldn't trust everyone and I needed to

103 protect myself from every angle. More than likely I would not have learned that in a school for business, or if it was taught, I probably would not have understood how important it was to protect myself. I was very grateful for this event, because when the next phase of my idea happened, things went quite differently.

I followed Mansfield Service Connection with a second website highlighting contractors in the town of Burleson, Texas, where it took me just three weeks to sign on twelve contractors. I had to use the name Burleson Connection since the domain name for Burleson Service Connection was taken. It was now a little bit over two months since I started and I had earned $27,000. I thought I had hit the big time. However, I did realize that I would be working all year for the money I had collected up front. I also knew that I wouldn’t be able to take on too many more websites before it became confusing and difficult to maintain, especially since I had to organize multiple advertising budgets for each website.

I was about to start my third website in Waxahachie, Texas, when the light bulb came on that I could conceivably create a website for every city in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. What would that look like and how could I do that by myself? Some cities were too big to market just one of each service, so how would I market towns with multiple zip codes that would take a lot more contractors to be able to reach? Just having one contractor under each category would not produce enough money to effectively market the bigger towns. It would require a much larger advertising budget to market Dallas, for example, than to market Mansfield. If I built all these websites, was there a way to market to all the towns in the area where I had contractors and not just one town at a time? I quickly realized it would be impossible to market everywhere, because every town would need a different website with a different name.

Only one answer made sense. I needed to create one website that still offered the exclusivity factor, but that I could market on mass media versus advertising in each individual town. In order to do that, I would have to change the format of what I had just sold in Mansfield and Burleson. I would need a way to collect money upfront from contractors who would be willing to wait an undisclosed period of time until I had enough contractors so that I could afford a marketing budget large enough to buy mass media. I had determined that the amount I would need would be no less than $50,000

104 per month to begin an effective advertising campaign on mass media like TV and radio. At this point there were only a couple of years in my life that I had earned $50,000 in a whole year, and the last few years I had been all but homeless. What were the chances that I could make $50,000 per month?

I had taken a leap of faith by beginning to implement the initial idea. The contractors from Mansfield and Burleson were willing to take the risk that I would find enough contractors to be able to begin marketing their websites. Now I would need to share my vision with enough contractors who were willing to wait “who knows how long” to test an idea that only resided in my mind. It was not simply a matter of my faith now, but the faith of everyone I talked with, who would give up their hard-earned money to invest in my idea, with no guarantee of future return on their investment. I had to sell the dream.

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32 The Good Contractors List

If I followed through on the dream, then I had to come up with a good name. I got used to telling people who were buying into my individual websites that it was like being a part of a good contractors list. So I thought The Good Contractors List sounded like a good name.

If you have had any experience trying to find a good website domain name you are probably laughing right now, because to find a domain name as simple as The Good Contractors List in 2011 would have been a miracle. With all the lists out there that highlight contractors and provide lead services, a dot com for that simple of a name would be impossible. So I went to GoDaddy.com and tried “The Good Contractors List” dot com and it was available. That was cool, but it had the word “The” in it. For fun I decided to try “Good Contractors List” dot com, then “Good Contractor List” dot com. Every form of the name was available in a dot com! I thought, “Are you serious?"

I have been around the block enough to know that this in itself was a miracle, and because it was such a miracle, the name of my company would forever be The Good Contractors List. Because of the situation I had faced with the person who bought my future domains for Service Connections, I went ahead and purchased every domain I could that had the words of my company in them. I secured the name before I told a soul about my idea. Then I went further and began the process of getting the term trademarked, and I started the process of incorporating so that no company would be able to steal the name or use it anywhere in the United States.

The Good Contractors List became a legitimate business on 11/11/2011. I collected my first check to The Good Contractors List on the same day. On a side note, for many years I had many occurrences where the number 11 and especially the number 1111 showed up when I needed reassurance. I would randomly look at a clock at exactly 11:11 or see it on a billboard or license plate. I always felt that God was using those moments to assure me that He was still with me and that He was taking care of things.

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Before my heart attack and our rushed marriage, Cindy and I were planning on getting married on 11/11/11, but the week I got out of the hospital and without pre-planning, we ended up getting married on 2/11/11. This was the soonest date that we could get married by the Justice of the Peace after I was released from the hospital. People may think I am crazy, but I still find comfort in these little signs from above.

Now that I had the name of my new company and was able to get my first contractor to agree to my terms, I was on my way. In the beginning I didn’t even have a website, because it would involve a data base and I didn’t have a clue about how to build one. The first thirty contractors joined based on me drawing it out on a piece of paper and saying that someday we would have a website, and someday we would have enough contractors to afford to advertise the group.

It had to be the anointing and favor of God that allowed me to convince people to give up their hard-earned money to support one guy’s dream, but that is exactly what happened. Contractor after contractor wrote a check for a one-time membership fee and a small monthly maintenance fee to help me reach my goal. The concept that God had downloaded into my consciousness was a real winner and people were willing to take a risk to be a part of it.

Most people paid $1000 to lock in their position and $30 per month until we reached what I called Phase 2, or marketing phase. The future rate they would agree upon would be between $200 and $500 per month. In the beginning I thought I would need over five hundred contractors who were committed to paying the future rate in order for me to advertise the group effectively. How was someone with no prior business sense, with no capital whatsoever, all by himself, going to pull this off? It is difficult to sell something with a proven track record for a commitment of $200 to $500 per month. How hard would it be to sell something that didn’t exist yet?

I don’t know. I just went out there and shared my dream and began adding on contractors. I was bombarded many times with doubts, because the people I met told me that I would never be able to do all of this on my own. I would need people who understood business and could build the infrastructure. I would need multiple sales reps who were much better at sales than I was to reach the number we needed in a

107 timely enough manner so that I didn’t lose the ones I had already sold. As a consequence of these comments and doubts, I immediately started looking for people to help me.

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33 Bring in the Smart Guys

Rick, the first man I brought on, was a self-proclaimed genius who openly shared that he was one of the most knowledgeable and effective sales people in the world. I am not exaggerating. He also was a seasoned contractor who knew and understood the contractor world. It didn’t take much for Rick to convince me that he was the man for the job. He had just lost his job as sales manager with a high-profile air conditioning company in the Dallas area and was available to come to work with me full time. He was a passionate sales person who was very good at his craft, or so he boasted, so I began to listen to him and his opinions.

Before I brought Rick on, I was averaging three to five contractors per week, but now I was spending countless hours talking with Rick nearly every day. He would share with me his wealth of knowledge, and my sales began to falter. I knew, though, that once he got rolling, he would build a sales team and it would start building itself and I could be less involved.

After several months of sporadic sales from him and a couple of times having to drive many miles to meet him at a gas station far from my home to pay for his gas, I started to become discouraged.

I was paying him 100% of the membership fee, so his sales did absolutely nothing to help me further the business. He became bolder as we continued forward and continually told me that I couldn’t do this without his help. He wanted to get us involved in some kind of gimmicky sales program that would teach us about marketing. My thought was that we should bring on more contractors before we committed money to learning about marketing. He basically told me I was an idiot and that he was committing us to this program whether I liked it or not.

Red flags were flying up all over the place, and I became very stressed out. I had no self-confidence, and Rick was a powerful force to deal with. He was beginning to become the authority in the business. I hate conflict, so I calmly listened to what he said and let him do what he thought we needed to do. He would tell me of the contractors

109 he was trying to bring on and how aggressively he was going after them. I began to feel extremely uncomfortable. I knew that I had to do something before I went down a path that I didn’t want for my company.

Rick exaggerated and made false claims on several occasions. He told the gimmicky marketing people he got us involved with that he was a partner and spoke of talking to nearly eight hundred contractors to get the eighty that we currently had on our list. That was a direct lie. It was clear to me that he was positioning himself to own the company. The objective of this recorded interview, according to Rick, was to make us look big and cause more contractors to trust in us, but I saw it as a strategy he was using to have proof that he was indeed a partner. So I called the marketing people and told them that he was not a partner and to destroy anything he had done with them. I then told them I wanted out of their program, and they understood and let me out with no problem.

I finally had to man up and confront Rick with his lies, and we ended our relationship. He had his best sales week the week I confronted him, bringing in five new contractors. We communicated a few times by email, but the end result was that he was furious and said a lot of mean things. Among other things, he told me I was obtuse. I had to look up the word and realized that I probably was obtuse. I really didn’t know what I was doing, but I wasn’t so obtuse as to continue to follow Rick. This emotional and stressful event set me back, but I soldiered on and continued to search for someone smarter than me to build the business.

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34 Wearing Someone Else's Armor

I would go through three more managers and more than ten sales reps before I realized that I was the only one who could sell this product. I know it seems ridiculous, but there was no one who could make a living selling The Good Contractors List. I spent most of my time training these guys who were supposed to be smarter and more skilled than I was, to find the same results from all of them. They would be unable to make sales, then they would feel that they should own part of the business since they worked so long for "free." They were paid for every sale they made or that I made for them, and I even paid the managers a percentage of my own sales since it was pretty much all that was coming in.

To my amazement, when the managers were unable to get the sales flowing or hire enough sales reps to match what I was doing by myself, they would demand that I give them a percentage of the company or they would not continue to work. It was a different story for all of them, but the end result was the same. I was no further along than when I met them, and I know these people were angry with me for cutting ties with them.

It was very discouraging, and I had to get tough skin in a very short amount of time. I don’t like hurting people’s feelings, but I had to tell each one of them what they did not want to hear. I had to tell them that they had not accomplished anything and didn’t contribute enough to own a part of the company, with the result that they were angry with me. After wasting hundreds of hours and emotional energy trying to get them to do what I was doing, I finally resigned myself to just do it and leave sales people and managers out of the equation. Even though it seemed ridiculously impossible that I could accomplish all that needed to be done on my own, it was obvious that I would have been much further along if I had not spent a year trying to avoid doing it myself.

The day finally came when I was able to launch the marketing. I ended Phase 1 with one lone sales rep who would make a sale every couple of weeks. Ironically it was a humble and soft spoken man named Rick.

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31 David and Goliath

God showed me something very clearly after I reached the next phase and could say that the company had gotten this far on mostly my own efforts. He showed me that I was trying to wear somebody else’s armor. Let me explain.

In the story of David and Goliath, David was a young shepherd and the least in his house, but God had plans for David. One day as David was bringing provisions to his brothers, who were preparing for battle against the Philistines, he learned that a challenge had been presented to Israel. The Philistines had sent out their great warrior, the giant Goliath, who was challenging Israel to send a warrior from their camp. The soldiers of Israel were scared and no one would step up to fight Goliath. When David saw this, he became angry to see the people of God cowering and said that he would fight the giant.

The men who saw that David was serious rushed David to King Saul, who quickly fitted David with his own armor. Can you imagine how it would feel to be brought directly to the king? Then to have the honor of wearing warrior’s armor--not just any warrior, but that of the king himself? David allowed the king to equip him with the tools that warriors used, but realized quickly that the weight of the armor would slow him down. It would render him unable to fight the only way he knew how, with a lowly sling and the favor of God. So he put away the armor and took down the giant.

God wanted to do something impossible to show His strength to all that would see. He needed David to face Goliath with a sling and a prayer and no obvious strength of his own. David was a shepherd, not a fighter. Even though David was small and unprotected, with no training in being a warrior, God brought David glory, which brought Him glory.

Like David, I believe that God had a job for me. He wanted to use me to build The Good Contractors List, because in this way he could prove His strength. I had no skills in building a business. I had never even managed a group of people. I was a decent salesperson, but never the best. The only way this could have come to fruition is if it

112 had the absolute favor of God, and if I soldiered forward in faith that He would be there. No one would be able to say that it was because I was so smart or had picked smart people. They could only come to one conclusion: that God was in this and He was able to use an uneducated, unsophisticated, three-time-divorced loser with a heart problem to do something really great. Glory to God!

I see The Good Contractors List as a springboard to God’s ultimate mission to build His Kingdom on Earth. Like the story of David and Goliath, God has a plan for anyone who is willing to enter the battlefield of life with faith and God-centered purpose.

What makes David different from any of God’s children? God wants to use all of us in great and mighty ways. He wants to take us in our frailty and our lack and prove His power through us. I may never do the amazing feats that King David did, but I can continue to step out on the battlefield with my sling. God is searching for those who will trust in Him so that He can do His work in us and through us. I believe that He has a much bigger mission than to provide great contractors to homeowners. He wants to change people’s lives with the message of hope.

If God can use a guy like John Hill to touch the lives of people, why can’t he use you? Are you willing to commit yourself to do whatever He asks you to do? Are you willing to trust Him to change you from the inside out and to humbly follow His direction for your life?

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36 The Answer to the Tough Questions

I came clean a little earlier and told you why I shared the two questions. However, I feel it is important to share that these are still questions that I realize I may never fully understand. If I left the impression that I now have all the answers, then I wouldn’t be true to myself or to you as the reader. I have accepted an answer that works for me and maybe it will be enough for someone else as well. Let’s do a recap of the questions.

Question 2: If the Bible is the absolute word of God, then which version is the “right” one, and who has the authority to call it the absolute Word of God?

The answer is “Vanity, all is vanity. God knows something we don’t know.”

No man or woman on the planet knows what God knows. The wisest of the wise, King Solomon, nailed it when he said “all is vanity” in the book of Ecclesiastes another interpretation says “all is worthless”. We can look at the evidence and come to our own conclusions, but our conclusions are coming from a fallible human being. We can hear an individual's interpretation of the Bible and even convince ourselves that it is the truth, but we are believing it with a human mind, and there is no one who can prove that their way is the right way.

What does hell have to do with salvation and our relationship with God? Knowledge of it may bring about an effect, but what does that knowledge have to do with our actual salvation?

What does believing every story in the Bible have to do with salvation and our relationship with God? It obviously strengthens our knowledge and provides a way for God to speak with us through His Word, but is the real relationship with God

114 accomplished because you read and believe everything you read? What must we believe in order for there to be salvation?

John 3:16 - For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.

We must believe that God is a God of love and that He loved us so much that He sent His Son Jesus to be the sacrifice for our sins. Period.

Our faith must be based in what He did, not in what we think we know. We are frail human beings and even the things we think we know, we may later discover that we didn’t know at all. The mind is a hodgepodge of thoughts and misconceptions and can’t be trusted. What we know in our spirits, in that deep place of relationship, is all we can count on. The Bible calls this being spirit-minded versus being carnally minded.

Romans 8:6-7

For to be carnally minded is death, but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be. (King James Version)

The mind governed by the flesh is death, but the mind governed by the Spirit is life and peace. The mind governed by the flesh is hostile to God, it does not submit to God’s law, nor can it do so. (New International Version)

So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death, but letting the Spirit control you leads to life and peace. For the sinful nature is always hostile to God, for it does not submit to God’s law, indeed, it cannot. (New Living Translation)

The problem is that there is always the battle between your carnal nature and your spiritual connection. When you think “carnal,” think “what makes me feel good.” Lust, pride, self-centeredness, all of these come from the carnal nature. When you put your faith in your own knowledge, is that not being carnally minded? When you put your faith in your relationship with God and trust that He knows what He is doing, does it really matter what you mentally struggle with?

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Proverbs 3:5

Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding (New American Standard Bible)

Hope in the Lord Jehovah from your whole heart and do not trust upon the wisdom of your soul (Aramaic Bible in Plain English)

For years I pushed Jesus away and wanted to “throw the baby out with the bath water." I assumed that because I couldn’t completely grasp the answers to these two questions and many others, then I couldn’t possibly be a Christian.

One day while driving in my car I realized that I whole-heartedly believe that Jesus sacrificed His life for me. I know it beyond my mind, and I love Him deeply. So what if I have doubts that the Bible is perfect and complete? Can’t I still believe what the Spirit of God says to me when I read the Bible, even if I don’t understand or have doubts about parts of it?

So what if I don’t understand hell? Am I lost if it is hard for me to believe that my loving Father has plans to eternally punish everyone who failed to understand His love in their short time on earth? Is it wrong to think that we don’t really know all the details of what He has planned?

Some may say that I am lost and that it is dangerous to question the contents of the Bible, but I have to say this: If all I know is that Jesus loves me and I am saved by His mercy and grace through His great sacrifice, then does it matter if I know anything else with great certainty? Is there anything more important than Jesus? Is there any other story that can be told by which we are saved?

Is the following scripture true?

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Romans 8:38-39 - For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Do you believe that? Read it again very slowly and look at each thing the Bible says will not separate us from the love of God.

Now let me ask you a couple of other questions. Will confusion separate us? How about doubt? Read the scripture again and ask if our feeble humanity can ultimately separate us from the love of God if the things in this list cannot keep us from His love. When we read scriptures like this, it should give us confidence that God knows something we don’t. It should remove all doubt that He has a plan for every one of the souls He created. He is love and loves all of His children the same, right? Just a thought to ponder.

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37 The Gospel

What is it that we are supposed to share to see people saved? Many of us think it is our responsibility to save people by sharing the gospel with them. How do we do that? Do we ask people if they know Jesus? Do we tell them about sin and they are sinners? Do we quote scriptures and warn them about hell? How did the disciples do it?

After Jesus resurrected from the dead, He spent some time with the Disciples and tasked them with sharing the gospel. He gave them very specific instructions. His first directive was to tell them to wait. He didn’t instruct them to tell people about their sins or that they were going to hell if they didn’t repent, he told them to wait. Wait for what? He told them to wait for the Holy Spirit. The Disciples did as Jesus instructed and the Holy Spirit moved. If you read the Acts of the Apostles you will see a clear pattern of how thousands were saved. It all starts with being filled with the Holy Spirit, who is the actual one who draws men unto Jesus. Let me repeat that, the Holy Spirit is what draw men to Jesus, not words or gospel tracts. Look for the pattern.

The first miracle that happened was when the Disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit in the upper room and spoke in tongues. The people were amazed that these Galilaeans were speaking in a tongue that everyone (all speaking different languages) could understand (Acts 2:6-12) and the Disciples were speaking the wonderful works of God.

This confused some people, but it was no doubt amazing to them. The people tried to understand how this could be and began making their own assumptions. Some even went as far as to mock them and say they were drunk with wine.

Now with a big question mark above the heads of those that were watching, Peter speaks the message. He first points out that the miracle was not a result of something the men had done in themselves. He said, “These guys are not drunk as you may think! This is what the prophet Joel was talking about.” Then after mentioning several prophecies that the listeners were familiar with, he then points to Jesus as the fulfillment of those prophesies. He pleads with the people to repent and be baptized in

118 the name of Jesus for the remission of sins. The result was that 3000 believed and were saved.

The second miracle specifically highlighted in the Acts happened at the temple where Peter and John found a lame man begging for alms. Again they used the name of Jesus to produce a miracle and the lame man walked, which caused the people to again be amazed.

Acts 3:11 – And as the lame man which was healed held Peter and John, all the people ran together unto them in the porch that is called Solomon’s, greatly wondering. (KJV)

Now that the people were standing around amazed and wondering, Peter again draws their attention away from man as the miracle producer. He said, “Why do you marvel at this and look at us as if through our own power or holiness made this man walk?” (Acts 3:12)

Peter then goes into the message of how the one that healed the man was Jesus, the very man that was crucified, but was now raised from the dead, and it is in His name that this lame man was made whole. He spoke to them right where they were in their understanding, by reciting prophecies they knew were associated with the Messiah in order to bring them to the final message. Repent, turn to God, so that your sins may be blotted out. This message really upset the religious people and the messengers were thrown in jail for the night. The result was that around 5000 people believed and were saved.

It didn’t stop there, because then Peter and John were brought in front of the high priests where they got another chance to speak the Gospel of Jesus.

I see a very clear pattern in how the Disciples shared the Gospel. It all started with a miracle or action that caused people to wonder what was going on. I would like to mention here that these miracles can only be made by God. Once the onlookers were amazed at the action of the person, the attention was immediately taken off the one they thought did the miracle. Now in the spotlight, the person would share something that made sense to them (he met them right where they were in their understanding) and then pointed to Jesus as the true producer of the miracle. Once they were focused on

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Jesus, then they would share with them the good news that their sins could be forgiven if they would just repent, turn from their sin, and turn to God.

Salvation didn’t start with someone telling an uninterested person that they are going to hell if they don’t believe the Bible. It didn’t start by judging the person and giving them advice on how they should live. It didn’t start with guilt or shame or fear. It started with a miracle created by God, in a person that couldn’t have done it on their own. God did the miracle, God drew the people, God did the saving, and all we did was the telling when we were given the opportunity.

What is your story? Has God done a miracle in your life? Do you use your story to share Jesus with those that God would draw to you? Do you give God the glory when people are amazed at something that happens in your life that was beyond your abilities? If we are believers, filled with the Holy Ghost, then miracles will happen and we will have the opportunity to give the glory to Jesus. We just have to be aware and move when we feel the Spirit moving. It is not up to us to save anyone, it is up to us to be obedient and willing.

God speaks to all of us right where we are and not everyone is in the same place. Many will read this book and it may not mean anything to them. It may even anger some that think I am lost for admitting that things don’t always make sense. However, I have to believe that there are a few that understand what I have been through and will see Jesus in the miracles that happened in my life. My prayer is that my lack of understanding and being honest about the tough questions will give someone who has the same problem a way to stop worrying about what they don’t know and simply seek God with their whole heart. I hope they look at me and see that it wasn’t me that did anything of value, but that it was Jesus in me that was the producer of anything good. If Jesus can use me, then there is hope for anyone.

Do you believe the Gospel? Do you believe that God loves you? I am here to tell you there are no depths that you can go that can separate you from the love of God. You can repent of your shortcomings and failures, turn to God, and He will fill you with His love and you don’t have to have any of the answers to get there. Simply believe that He

120 loved you enough to sacrifice the Son that was most precious to Him to give all of us life. I promise, you will never make a better decision in your life.

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38 Our Real Purpose

I realize every day I wake up and face my own human weaknesses that I am not equipped to tell anyone how to live their lives. If you are reading this book, then it is obvious that God has done a lot with me since my deathbed experience, otherwise there wouldn’t be a book. I hope that my crazy life has somehow proven that God can use even a yo-yo like me to touch others.

For as long as I can remember, I have wondered what God’s will was for my life and I have been searching for my purpose in life. Without purpose and direction, it is difficult to have a fulfilled life. I think that most of us have at one time or another been faced with the question, “Why am I here?” Although every person has their individual purpose, whether they know what it is or not, I believe that God has a purpose for all people that is common for everyone.

I believe the day I had a choice to live or die, God provided me with three desires that reflect the purposes God has for everyone on the planet. If we can focus on these three things, it won’t matter if we are rich or poor, if we are famous, or if people recognize what we have done! Our lives will be so fulfilling that the joy of living is the only thing that matters.

Here are the three things I petitioned God for if I were to remain on the planet: 1. I wanted to be remembered for doing something good. 2. I wanted to live every day, not just be alive. 3. I wanted to touch as many people’s lives as possible while I am on this Earth.

I had realized that it would have been easier and far better for me to leave the world and be wholly reconnected to my Father. I was not afraid to die, and a big part of me was ready to go and leave the suffering of this world behind. However, something inside of me wanted to be a tool for God. God had planted His Spirit inside of me and I had not allowed that Spirit to have complete control of me yet, although I had always wanted to do God’s will.

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Paul said it this way:

Phillipians 1:22-25 - If I am to go on living in the body, this will mean fruitful labor for me. Yet what shall I choose? I do not know! I am torn between the two: I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far, But it is more necessary for you that I remain in the body. Convinced of this, I know that I will remain, and I will continue with all of you for your progress and joy in faith. (New International Version)

It was on the operating table that I realized that if I were going to stay here, it would not be just for me. Ultimately, I didn’t care about riches. I didn’t care about living a life of ease. I just wanted to be what God wanted me to be. The three requests came from a pure and unselfish place in what could have been the final moments of my life.

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39 Request #1: Be Remembered for Doing Something Good

This request may sound a little selfish, because I used the words “I want to be remembered." What I wanted, though, was for God to use me in a way that would show His goodness. People do many things to show how unselfish they are, or to put a feather in their cap. My request was not about just doing good things. Rather, I wanted His goodness to flow through me like it did in Jesus. When someone remembers me, I want them to remember Him. Doing good works is wonderful and it should be something we want to do, but I do not believe that merely doing good things will fulfill your purpose. We must be in tune with God’s Spirit and, to do so, we have to be in a place of complete submission.

One of the most powerful scriptures in the Bible speaks to what I am talking about here. When we reach the place where we get out of the way, God does it all. We become a vessel for Him to do His good, not a person trying to do everything right. When we put our complete faith in Him and truly desire His will over our own will, just watch out.

Romans 11:36 - For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory forever. Amen.

This ending to a chapter in the letter to the Romans seems like such a quick and simple verse, but take a moment to really grasp the essence of what it says:

For of Him – all things originate from Him or, if we want to get deep, of Him

And through Him – God is the one who facilitates His will. As much as we want to take the credit sometimes, it is God who does it all.

And to Him – He is even the one who lifts the glory back to Himself. He doesn’t need us to worship Him. When our spirits reach a place of worship, it is because He made it that way. He didn’t design worship to be for Himself; it is for us! He facilitated the whole thing and when we allow ourselves to do the things He is doing through us, then the glory is His forever and we will be “glorified” in the process. Do you allow worship to

124 flow through you or do you force it out of you? There is a difference between worship and making yourself a sacrifice.

This scripture describes the place I want to be every day and every moment of my life. My longing to be remembered for something good was a request to be perfectly in line with His perfect will for my life and allow His goodness to shine through me in a way that would bring glory to Him. My wishes echo Jesus' words in this prayer at the end of His life on earth.

John 17: 1-5 - After Jesus said this, he looked toward heaven and prayed: “Father, the hour has come. Glorify your Son, that your Son may glorify you. For you granted him authority over all people that he might give eternal life to all those you have given him. Now this is eternal life: that they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent. I have brought you glory on earth by finishing the work you gave me to do. And now, Father, glorify me in your presence with the glory I had with you before the world began."

Jesus' prayer can open our eyes. If it were the only scripture we were able to salvage, it would be enough to save the world.

Jesus did not come to Earth to do good things. He came to Earth to do the work He was given to do. Jesus had one purpose and that was to glorify the Father, the only true God, and present to us what it was like to live by the Spirit that lived within Him. The only reason Jesus wanted any glory for Himself was to return that glory to the Father. Jesus was the perfect example of a human being who understood and allowed God to have complete control over His life. All things that Jesus did came "of" God, and "through" God, and back "to" God.

This is wonderful news for us. Because of what Jesus did here on Earth, He has made that same Spirit available to all of us. We can’t know Jesus the human being, but we can know Christ, which is the anointing, which is the pure Spirit of God. Christ was not Jesus’ last name, it means “The Anointed One.” Jesus always pointed to the Father and to the Spirit that connected them as one.

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Romans 8:11 - And if the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead is living in you, He who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through His Spirit, who lives in you.

It does not say here that Jesus (the man) gives you life, or that Jesus comes and lives inside of you, but the Spirit of Him who raised Jesus from the dead. That same Spirit that propelled Jesus (the Christ) lives in you and gives you life. Jesus clearly defined the Father as the one true God and then pointed out the anointing that was given to Him.

We forget sometimes that Jesus was 100% human as well as God’s one and only Son. Eternal life is knowing the one true God and accepting the Spirit of Him that raised Jesus from the dead to have a place in your life. The Christ, or anointing, that Jesus brought to Earth through complete submission, is what comes and lives inside of us and propels us to do the good works of the Father. Jesus was one with The Father, and we are all one with Him through the anointing that lived in Jesus, the Christ.

Philippians 4:13

I can do all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. (King James Version)

Because I master all things by The Messiah (Christ and Messiah are interchangeable) who empowers me (Aramaic Bible in Plain English)

When we submit ourselves to that extent, then doing good works is neither a religious act nor an act of trying. It is the life blood of our existence.

I think that if all of us could strip away the hurt, guilt, and negativity in our lives, we would realize that there are moments when we feel that we are part of something much greater than ourselves. There was a moment when you felt your energy connect to something outside of yourself. Some people find this in prayer, some find it while they are fishing, but the one thing in common is that in order to find that connection, the person needs to be alone with God and open their heart.

If you can open your heart and still your mind, you will find God waiting for you. You don’t have to know how He works. You don’t have to have a mental image of Him. You

126 don’t have to have any of the answers. You just need to be still and know that He is God, and that he rewards those who seek after Him with all their hearts.

I spent years telling people to seek God, and then I commenced to tell them what they needed to believe in order to seek Him the right way. Trying to convince someone to believe what you do and act like you do is not what God wants of you. He wants you to share the “good news” that He loved us so much that He would sacrifice what was holy and pure (Jesus) to offer a lost and empty person the opportunity to connect with Him and live a life of joy and purpose. Through simply reaching out to Him and making the first move, He puts the responsibility on Himself to make you who He wants you to be.

Trying to act a certain way won’t make it happen. Forcing yourself to read the Bible won’t make it happen. Strict praying schedules and church attendance won’t make it happen. Submitting yourself to the fact that you are imperfect and trusting in God to move you and change you is the only thing you can count on and the sooner you stop “trying,” the sooner He can start doing. I’m not saying not to pray, read your Bible, or go to church, just don’t base your relationship with God on activities. You and God are bound together when you just go to Him and ask Him for a relationship. He wants one with you, too.

God is beautiful and perfect in every way. He is not a judge sitting on a throne that we send our requests to and have to plead our case to for everything in life. He is the most loving friend and Father we could ever have and is so close you can touch Him. He wants to give us a big hug every day and tell us how much He loves us. He also wants to do as any good father would do and direct us to make the best decisions for our lives. He can and will speak to our hearts if we keep our spiritual ears open and truly want to do what He has planned for our lives.

That means taking action when we believe that He is giving us direction. It may be a small inspiration or it may be a gnawing inside that will not stop until you do what you know you are supposed to do. It may be asking someone whom you have wronged to forgive you. It may be forgiving someone who has wronged you. It may be giving that homeless man on the corner the cheeseburger you just bought. You will find the more you listen to that direction, the more direction you receive. If you are busy doing

127 something you thought you were supposed to do and find it miserable to do, then you may want to ask yourself if God had anything to do with your decision.

The point I am trying to make is, don’t just do good things, but shoot for doing the exact good things you believe God wants you to do. That only comes through a consistent open heart to God and a commitment to doing exactly what He tells you to do. I am not saying that you need to lock yourself in a closet until God speaks to you. Rather, in order to experience the fullness of doing something good, you should do it from somewhere greater than your mind trying to fulfill a duty.

Have you ever done something good for someone and it seemed to hurt the situation more than it helped? Have you ever worked for countless hours or even a short amount of time doing something you felt you needed to do out of duty or obligation, only to find out that nobody really cares and you hated every minute of it? Be honest!

Doing good things without the direction of God is like playing an instrument in the band and not knowing what song you are supposed to play. You can be the best, most skilled person on your instrument, but if you start playing your own tune in the middle of a concert, it sounds horrible and causes confusion among the others in the band. However, if you are given your sheet of music and the part that best suits your level of skill and ability, when the conductor raises his baton you know where to come in, then everyone is in harmony and it creates a work of art that can move nations.

The problem most people have when they intend to do something good is they start trying to figure everything out in their minds. Many find themselves working on something that God never intended for them to do. It may all work together for the ultimate good for the person, but it can put a real damper on their immediate joy. It was just work and not a pleasure.

If God wanted you to dig a ditch or clean a toilet, it would be work and pleasure for those doing it, because they know in their heart that is what God really wants them to do. Otherwise something within themselves will not feel right. They may do it for a while, but will eventually tire and quit. This may cause them to feel guilty for leaving the ditch and toilet to someone else. However, the next person may get extreme joy

128 from the task, and they have been robbed of this joy while you were trying to accomplish your "duty."

When I asked God to allow me to be remembered for doing something good, I didn’t have a clue about what it was and didn’t really care what it was that I would be doing. I knew I was asking Him to open a door for me to accomplish His good on this earth. Every day I do and say what I know to do and say at that point in time. If I don’t believe it, then I don’t say it. If I get the opportunity to share my story with someone and it seems right, then I tell them my story. If someone opens up to me and the answer seems clear to me, then I will share with them what is on my heart. Sometimes just being quiet and listening to someone is exactly what I am supposed to do.

I certainly didn’t leave the hospital trying to formulate The Good Contractors List and, as you can tell from the story, didn’t have a clue how to do any of the things that I did. I just crossed every bridge when I got there and kept soldiering on. When I tried to do things I thought were right, it failed, and when I just let it go, things began to happen. Every day that you lean on Him and get out of your head, you will find things falling into place.

I live life to the fullest every day and do what I feel God wants me to do, but I don’t try to figure it all out. I live, work, and spend time with my family, just like everyone else. I do it with an open spirit and an open ear to God’s direction. You don’t have to become a fanatic who is constantly focused on, “What do you want me to do next?” You simply have to go about life knowing that all things are of God, and through God, and to God. Relax! He’s got you!

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40 Request # 2: Live Every Day, Not Just Be Alive

What does it mean to live? At one time in my life I would have said that living meant becoming successful or free from burden. I thought that if I could just get enough money I would be happy, if I could just find the right job I would be happy, if I could just learn to be good in relationships I would be happy.

I prayed for things and believed for things like “abundance” that would take away some of the stress of my life. I thought that being happy had everything to do with receiving. I listened to prosperity messages and read material from secular motivational speakers hoping that I would be able to learn how to think so I could obtain things that would make me happy. I tried to change my thinking about my family, my financial situation, my career, and many other aspects of my life.

I was searching for my life. I was looking for ways to improve my life. I was on the hunt for a way to gather enough things or have enough respect or be free from enough stress to have the life I had always dreamed of. It is quite ironic that I found my life on my deathbed.

I was not afraid to die on that hospital operating table. I was almost persuaded, from my own selfish desires, to tell God to go ahead and take me. However, something in me felt I was someone God could use, and that was what kept me here. I wasn’t concerned at that point about attaining things, or my financial situation, or my career. For the first time I saw that all I really wanted was for God to live through me. It was suddenly clear to me that to truly live meant more than having everything I thought I wanted. At that moment I didn’t want anything for myself.

In all my seeking for happiness and all my searching for significance, I found that dying was the only way to attain it. My “deathbed” experience was spurred by potential physical death, but you can have a deathbed experience right now, far from the end of your life! Let me explain. Consider this verse from the Bible.

Matthew 10:39 - He that finds his life shall lose it, and he that loses his life for my sake shall find it.

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If we spend our lives looking for things that will make us happy or free, we will lose true life. But if we lose the desire to be in control and the need to fulfill our physical or mental needs, we will find what is available for us in the Spirit. We will find true Life when we reach the point that God is living through us and our own desires are in alignment with His desires.

Is there any amount of things, or bragging rights, or success that can replace being happy? We spend our lives searching for something to make us happy, while God waits patiently for us to turn to Him for our joy. What is amazing is that when we begin to be happy, and none of the things we thought we needed have an impact on us anymore, it seems that more of the things we desire find their way to us. God wants to give us our heart's desire, but He doesn’t want our heart's desire to own us.

There is a story in the Bible that speaks to what I am writing here.

Matthew 19:16 - 23 16 Someone came to Jesus with this question: “Teacher, what good deed must I do to have eternal life?” 17 “Why ask me about what is good?” Jesus replied. “There is only One who is good. But to answer your question—if you want to receive eternal life, keep the commandments.” 18 “Which ones?” the man asked. And Jesus replied: “‘You must not murder. You must not commit adultery. You must not steal. You must not testify falsely. 19 Honor your father and mother. Love your neighbor as yourself.” 20 “I’ve obeyed all these commandments,” the young man replied. “What else must I do?” 21 Jesus told him, “If you want to be perfect, go and sell all your possessions and give the money to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” 22 But when the young man heard this, he went away sad, for he had many possessions. 23 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “I tell you the truth, it is very hard for a rich person to enter the Kingdom of Heaven."

I have heard many sermons on this scripture, and I have never heard anything that really made my spirit jump. I have heard preachers try to teach this literally, as a call to give in excess. It has been used to get people to feel guilty for not giving more to the

131 church. It has been used to teach a legalistic form of godliness, which was the opposite of what Jesus stood for while he was on this earth.

I absolutely love the personality of Jesus. He could sometimes be sarcastic in his dealings with people. When I read this scripture, I sense that kind of sarcasm in what Jesus was saying. He answers this guy differently than the woman at the well or any other person who came to him seeking truth.

Here comes this rich young hotshot who has watched Jesus do amazing things and getting all kinds of attention, so he decides he wants a little bit of what Jesus has. He saw the joy, he saw the looks of adoration in the eyes of the people, he could sense the greatness in Jesus. He already has money and everything he could ever want on earth, but the one thing he doesn’t have is whatever Jesus has.

This man wants the power of the connection that comes with being in the Spirit, but he doesn’t care about the actual Spirit of God. Jesus sees right through the man and calls him on his selfishness and on his religious piousness. Right away it is obvious that the man has missed the point of Jesus’ message. His first question to Jesus is, “What good deed must I do to have eternal life?”

Jesus pops back with, “Why are you asking me about what is good? There is only one who is good." Jesus answers by bringing up a "who" instead of a "what." I can see the big question mark forming above this young gentleman’s head.

Then, seeing that the young man is still not concerned about his relationship with God, but is interested in only doing what is necessary to gain power, Jesus says, "Okay, you need to keep the commandments."

Is that similar to anything we have heard from Jesus before? Remember, he said, “This is eternal life, that they know you, the only true God.” Remember that? Why wouldn’t Jesus mention the first and most important commandment, “I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me”? As a matter of fact, Jesus didn’t mention any of the

132 commandments that spoke specifically about God and only chose the ones that were physically and mentally accomplished.

Once Jesus presented these six commandments, the man recognized the law and says, “Aha, I have done all of those things! What else?”

Jesus then cuts to the chase and hits him where his treasure is. “Sell all that you have and give the money to the poor and come follow me.”

Again he has asked for a relationship. Just as he did with Peter, he gives this man the opportunity to follow him, but this man was “rich” in his own mind and was sad, because he realized he wanted his stuff more than he wanted what Jesus had in the Spirit.

Jesus knows what each of us needs individually, and it is our choice to do what he tells us to do. Many of us are asking the same questions as the rich young man and we don’t even realize it. We ask ourselves, “What do I have to do to live? What do I have to do to experience the joy that the Bible talks about?” The answer is not to sell all of your possessions and give it to the poor. Jesus did not mean that literally for everyone.

He was making a point that this particular man did not have what it took in his heart to experience Spirit, which was the “good” he was looking for. The young ruler thought that he could attain the life and power that Jesus presented without losing anything he had already attained. However, Jesus made it clear that following him and letting go of anything that has power over us, is the only way for us to have what Jesus has to offer. The young man cared nothing about God or knowing Him, he was merely searching for the end result. The young rich man wanted the power that Jesus had, to use it for his own selfish gain.

The answer that Jesus wants us to understand from this is not that we are supposed to do a list of things, but, rather, to completely release our lives to God and recognize His Spirit in everything that we do. We have to put away the desire to please ourselves with things. That does not mean you can’t have a nice home and money, but if those things own you and the only happiness you have is in things and in success, you will never

133 reach that place of power in the Spirit and never fully experience everything that God has to give you.

If you find your wealth in your possessions or anything else the earth offers, then joy will elude you. You may be able to keep yourself busy enough to overlook what you are lacking, but one day you will come face-to-face with the truth.

The only way to find life is to sacrifice your life to the will of Him who has the power to do and give all things. When He becomes our heart's desire, you will find Him and be fulfilled and thankful for everything you have and then all the things you desire on earth will come to you. When pleasing God is your heart’s desire, there is nothing you can attain or own that will be able to own you.

Matthew 6:33 - But seek you first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.

Matthew 6:21-22 - For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. The light of the body is the eye: if therefore your eye be single, your whole body shall be full of light.

There is one singular thing that is ultimately important, and that is seeking God to know Him. It is the complete fulfillment of our purpose for life. In order for His light to fill us, our eyes, hearts, minds, and whole being need to be focused on that one thing: seeking God to know Him.

Yielding ourselves to His will and allowing Him to live through us is the ultimate life. Learning to think right is a great step, which can change our lives for the better, but the only way to ever feel complete is to lay down our will and desires and fully submit to God’s will for our lives. There is no better place to be than submitted to the perfect will of God.

It is my prayer that I live every day, not just be alive, and I know that to live I must die to my own selfish desires.

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41 Request #3: Touch as Many Lives as Possible

Instead of trying to touch as many lives as we can, we need to touch the lives God gives us to touch. Before we can truly touch other people’s lives, we have to be available when God sends that person to us. It is not our job to go around telling everyone we meet about what God has done for us. That sounds very spiritual, but it is our own minds muddying up the water. We need to continue moving in the Spirit, especially when dealing with other people.

Instead of forcing ourselves to form relationships, we need to allow God to direct our steps and our words. This is incredibly important. Our new lives will affect people in different ways, so we need to contain our desire to change the world. God will change the world through us, but only if we are moving in unison with His perfect will. Not everyone will be happy about your new life and not everyone will want to hear about what God has done for you. In the beginning you may actually make some waves.

The Motorboat Effect

Every time I began to live my life according to God’s will, I noticed that not everyone was happy for me. When we start thinking in a different way and our lives begin to change for the better, something happens around us that I call the motorboat effect. If you aren’t prepared for this, it could cause you to give up, become disappointed, or slow your progress so as not to upset others. Do not let this change your current path! Things will smooth out after you get going and start building up speed.

Imagine that you are a high-speed motorboat that has been tied to a dock at the shore. When you decide to seek after God, you turn on the engine. When you decide to follow the Lord, you untie the boat. When you actually start moving and acting in the Spirit, you slam that baby into full throttle. What do you think happens when you throw a motorboat into full throttle at the shoreline? The back of the boat dips and the power of the motor kicks up mud and debris from the murky bottom of the water. In other words, it stirs up a lot of junk.

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The moment you start moving forward in following what the Spirit guides you to do, the spiritual waves it causes may upset many people. Sometimes the people closest to you, who have been hanging out at the dock and expecting you to be tied to the dock forever, will become upset and may try to kill your motor. Knowing this in advance may prevent you from being choked out before you get to the really good part.

Be patient with these people and don’t start trying to get them into the boat. Continue to enjoy your boat ride, and the ones who continue to love you and allow you to move forward will begin to benefit and want to follow along. Some may want to destroy you and will move far away from you. Some may be so miserable that they can’t handle that you have found something fulfilling. However, some will be caught in the drawing effect created by your forward propulsion and will be drawn after you. The ones who are pushed away the farthest may come back someday when they see that what has happened to you is real and you consistently show that you are different.

Some people will become offended at your new way of living and try to remind you of all the bad things you used to do, or they may become defensive about their own shortcomings. They may believe that you think you are better than they are and therefore distance themselves or cut you off completely. The more they see your relationship with God and realize it isn’t just your newfound ability to do the “right” things, they may want the relationship, too. Eventually they will understand that something beyond yourself has changed your life.

When I had my first real awakening, while in the navy, I saw that not everyone was going to be happy about my newfound joy. When you start walking more in the Spirit, you actually become a light. The light that is in you shines so brightly that it uncovers the darkness in people around you. It may make them want to crucify you. It may make them realize just how far away they are from God so that they start envying you. Your motorboat can stir up debris--old memories, emotions, habit patterns--that you never expected were residing in someone you think you know.

The Bible speaks about that light repeatedly and how some people do not understand the light.

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John 1:3-5 - Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

John 3:19-21 - This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

Isn’t there something in all of us that is imperfect? Don’t we all fall short of the glory of God? Then we need to go into our spiritual walk knowing that it is possible to offend some people. It is our place to do what God leads us to do and shine the light of His love to all people.

However, the light only shines when we are walking in His Spirit. I don’t believe it is our place to force our beliefs onto someone who is not open to receiving them. Some may disagree and think that it is their mission to do just that, but I believe that the light is enough. If the light isn’t bright enough to cause people to squint and try to figure out what is going on with you, then there is no amount of telling that is going to bring them to a place of acceptance. However, when their spirit senses the light, the light in them is attracted to the light in you.

That is when the motorboat analogy takes on new light. Pardon the pun. Have you ever run your finger through water that had floating particles or swam in a pool where it seemed that the floating particles were following you? When you move in the right direction and don’t stop to try and change other people, you will find that some of those people will begin to follow you. Something inside of them will say, “I want to have what that person has." You will have something so different and attractive to those who are in a place of seeking, but it isn’t your job to choose the ones you will try to bring over from the dark side. It is only your job to stay in the boat and allow the Holy Spirit to direct you. The Spirit will open the doors for you to talk to whomever He chooses for you to speak with.

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If you do it on your own, it could end up hurting the person more than help them and will only cause the person to push away from you and God. Allow the Spirit to open the door and present His perfect opportunity to you. Then you can touch all the people who are given to you. Even Jesus didn’t attempt to touch every person on Earth or even all those he came in contact with. He understood that he had been given some, and that his Spirit would live in them so that they could touch other people.

Just before he was taken to be crucified, Jesus offered this prayer to the Father:

John 17:6-11 - I have revealed you to those whom you gave me out of the world. They were yours; you gave them to me and they have obeyed your word. Now they know that everything you have given me comes from you. For I gave them the words you gave me and they accepted them. They knew with certainty that I came from you, and they believed that you sent me. I pray for them. I am not praying for the world, but for those you have given me, for they are yours. All I have is yours, and all you have is mine. And glory has come to me through them. I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name, the name you gave me, so that they may be one as we are one.

It is not our job to change the world or attempt to cause every person we come into contact with to accept Jesus as their savior. Like Jesus, our purpose is to know God and follow his Spirit. If you are trying to keep a tally of all the souls you brought into the Kingdom, then you have missed the boat. Don’t let your spirit-filled life be affected by your need to succeed. Success comes when you aren’t trying to be a success, and life comes when you give up your life.

Do you want to touch as many lives as possible? Then simply live every moment for the glory of God. He will bring glory to you so you can bring people to Him. Get out of the way and stop devising your own tactics. The Spirit of God is the only one who can lead a person to Jesus. Get out of His way!

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42 Where Am I Now

I wanted to share where I am today in my walk with God and how things have changed in me. It is really easy to say “focus on God” and hope that people assume that things are perfect now that I have had this amazing realization, but I believe it is important to be completely transparent with where I am today as well as my past.

I can honestly say that I am happier than I have ever been in my life. My wife, Cindy, and I have a wonderful and confident relationship and I don’t worry about going through another divorce. We absolutely love each other and I have never felt so accepted by a human being in my life. I am being used by God on a daily basis and I have never felt closer to Him. So I have indeed experienced “living” versus just being alive. I am seeing the purpose in my life and God is using me to touch as many people as I can while I am here. I believe God is completely holding up His end of the deal, when it comes to my deathbed requests. I am a faithful member of a wonderful local church that really cares about reaching out to lost people. I have the pleasure of being used there and enjoying corporate worship without the need to move up the ministry ladder. The Good Contractors List has also grown and is on network TV and radio in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and I couldn’t ask for a better group of home service contractors.

Now, with all that being said, I have to admit that I still have questions that don’t make sense to me and I still make mistakes on a regular basis. I get sick of myself sometimes and the way I still think too much. I get frustrated when I can’t seem to get something right that I promised myself I would get better at doing. My wife loves me with all of her heart and I have no fear of her going away, but she can get really frustrated with me when I get hyper focused on work, or I find myself on my cell phone answering emails while we are at a restaurant. There are times that I don’t feel like a good husband or I fail as a father or friend. In other words, I am a human being.

When I chose to live, now 3 years ago, something amazing happened in me. I have a new perspective that helps me stay the course. I will share it with you and maybe you can use it to help you when you are struggling with sin. I am not a big fan of “methods” to do things only the Spirit can do, but I do believe that He uses experiences to help give

139 us a renewed mind. Maybe my experience will be useful to you. The one thing that I cling to every day that helps me make right decisions is that there is a reason that I am still alive. I was ready to go, but I chose to stay because I believed that I was here for a purpose. Every time I start dealing with my flesh, I become acutely aware that if every decision I make isn’t for the benefit of God and others, then there is no reason for me to be here. I have a new responsibility to stay alive to fulfill the purpose that kept me here. I don’t want to live if I am not being what God wants me to be.

I believe there is a key to becoming what God wants you to be. It really is not a matter of trying harder, but believing deeper. It is about understanding yourself as both a human being AND who you are in Christ. As a human I am frail, I am a cheater, I am a liar, I am someone who can betray God and be extremely selfish. There will never be a day that I am so advanced that I couldn’t go back to a roller coaster life. If you lose sight of who you are as a human and what you are capable of, then it may not be long before you are reminded. I am extremely aware of my frailty, but I am at the same time aware of His strength. The only thing I can hold onto is that I also know what I am in Christ. I am an overcomer, I have the capacity to love deeply and see people’s lives changed, I am a child of the King of Kings and co-heirs with Christ Himself! So, why would I want to spend a moment trying to satisfy the human side of me? The more I let go of that desire, amazingly, the more my human side is blessed! Joy doesn’t come from things that happen to you or the things you can attain, joy is a result of what the Spirit does in you. No amount of success can do it, no amount of money can do it, and finding the right relationship can’t do it. There is nothing that can bring real joy outside of the Spirit of God. Yet I love that He even supplies some of the things we want along the way. Just when you don’t need them and won’t be moved by their presence, then it is possible to bring them into your life and still bring glory to God.

When pride or ego starts to rear its ugly head, I can now say “I see you there pride and I accept that I am a human being that experiences pride, but I have a purpose that doesn’t include you.” Then I pray and ask God to use my frailty to show His power.

I fully believe that whatever happens to me, good or bad, is all going to be used to glorify God. Why? Because I know that his glory is the true desire of my heart. If it wasn’t, then I would have chosen to die and get off this planet. Like I said previously,

140 there for a while after I got home from the hospital that I was struggling with whether or not I was even a Christian. One day I was thinking about something that didn’t make sense to me, as usual, and spoke an odd prayer that I truly felt with all my heart. I was thinking about how God hardened Pharaoh’s heart, how He allowed the devil to enter Judas Iscariot, and how He used these dishonorable people to accomplish His will. I remember very clearly what I said to God and I meant it with everything within me. I said, “God I love you and if you have to use me to do something dishonorable in order to bring you glory and see more people saved and believing in you, then I am yours to do with as you please. I hope you don’t use me as a vessel of dishonor, but that is how much I love you.” It wasn’t long after that heartfelt surrender to be used how HE wanted me to be used and not how I thought He should use me, that I understood that I was 100% a Christian. Not because I knew all the answers, but because I love Jesus and believe that He is my Savior and can trust in Him to reveal what I need to know. After all this up and down living, it was being able to surrender ALL of what I want to God’s control, that freed me.

When I think about dying daily, it has real meaning to me now. I am really a dead man walking, and the only thing that is keeping me alive is the Spirit that propels me. If I am not responding to His Spirit, then I am useless and I am living for the wrong thing. I pray that I will always humbly come to Him as my only source and will never allow myself to think I have any power outside of what God gives me. It is my prayer that you remain in Him and that you feel His amazing love for you.

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Epilogue

Seeking and finding God is the absolute most important thing that we can ever do. He is the one who gives us breath and life and He wants us to live life to the fullest. He wants us to learn to let go of our selfish desires and live by way of the Spirit. If we seek Him, we will find Him. That is a promise He has made over and over again.

We may not have all the answers, but what we know in our minds is not what is most important. We must first make that connection with God in the Spirit and allow our minds to be changed. It doesn’t happen the other way around. If you are stuck in a vicious cycle of addiction and physical strongholds, then the only way to overcome those issues is through the Spirit of God. He will show you who you really are, a child of God with a real purpose for being here.

I have taken you through many of the struggles I've had with sin and doubt. I have bared my soul and shared with you what I have come to believe in my spirit. I am not a seasoned and polished evangelist with a theological degree and a huge following. I am not a licensed therapist or a spiritual guru. I am simply a regular guy who has spent his life failing and getting up over and over.

It seems I have been awakened to know, in part, what I believe God wants me to do. I spend every moment trying to do as Jesus did, and say and do what God instructs me to do. I can’t claim to know anything 100%, other than that God loves us greatly and wants the best for us. I refuse to pretend that I have all the answers.

If there is anything that I hope you take away from reading this book, it is that God is real and He can use even a big goofball like me for His glory. He loves you so much and, somewhere in the depths of your being, is calling your name. I would love to know that my lack of knowledge and my questions have somehow helped you shake off everything you think you need to do or be in order to seek God.

I want you to know that it is okay not to have all the answers, but if you start seeking God right where you are, you will soon find a place of joy, peace, and safety. I want you

142 to see that God wants to give us all that our hearts desire, but that the desire to know Him more is by far the best thing we can seek after.

It was not my purpose to try and make you doubt what you are convinced you know or suggest that you must leave church or anything else I have gone through. This is your life to live. All I want anyone to understand is that God has His ways of leading us, and we should do all we can to trust Him and follow His lead, even if it means not doing what others think we should do.

We are given the power of free will and can choose what we want out of life. We can choose to be successful, and we can choose to think in such a way that will bring us misery. We have the power to create our own world, but if it isn’t in line with God’s perfect will for our lives, we will never reach our fullest potential and will not be completely fulfilled while we are on this earth. God has a perfect plan for each of us and it is up to us to get close enough to Him to allow Him to direct our steps and bring us to our ultimate destiny.

The following scripture sums up the message of this book, showing us how our Creator wants us to be when we come to Him:

Matthew 18:3 - I tell you the truth, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

I love this analogy of coming to God as a child. The “kingdom of heaven” represents the fullness that God has for us, not just a place called heaven. There is a place of completeness that happens when you come to God with the innocence and expectations of a child.

Jesus is saying that until you can stop relying on your own abilities and understanding of what to do and how to do it, you will never reach that place of fulfillment and completeness in God.

Imagine a child, whether it be yourself as a child or one of your own children. How does a child react when he or she makes a connection with a loving entity? Barney, the

143 big purple dinosaur, is a good example. When he sings, “I love you, you love me, we’re a happy family,” all the kids want to rush toward him and give him a big hug. To those children, at that moment, Barney represents all the love in the world. Little children don’t care who is watching them or what others may be thinking. When Barney is dancing and having fun, the children are dancing with him and having the time of their lives. When Barney wants to get serious for a moment and tell them something very important, the children stop and listen.

As we grow older and reach the point where we are more aware of what people are thinking about us, we stop wanting to play with other kids and give up the simplicity of childhood pleasures. We become concerned and sometimes afraid of what our peers and others will think about the way we are thinking or behaving.

Do you remember how much fun it was to spin around in circles till you couldn’t stand up? We would laugh and get up and do it again and again. We could imagine ourselves being anything we wanted to be. I was a ninja warrior with a stick and a Clorox bottle hanging from a tree limb. I would fight off all the bad guys and shatter them with my super-powered ninja sword. We believed that people were good and anything they told us was the truth. If we were given freedom to act silly, we would act silly with enthusiasm. If we were given free access to play, we would play with all of our heart and try to enjoy every possible opportunity.

If God is truly our Father, then as a father I can only in part understand how He would want us to come to Him. He is so much greater than I am that I can assume that anything I could come up with would pale in the truth. Based on the scripture and my feeble understanding, I would imagine that God wants us to come to Him--open and wanting all of His love, just like a child. He is the greatest source of love that we can come to and He wants to speak to us about our lives.

As our Father, God wants to participate in our lives and wants us to come to Him with our hopes and dreams. God truly wants to give you everything as well as the things you don’t even know you’re going to want. He wants you to jump up into his big ole’ lap and tell Him about your day with all the excitement and purity of a child. He wants to spin around the yard with you and laugh as you laugh together. He wants you to

144 love Him, just because He is the most important thing in your life and not out of religious obligation or with the “right” knowledge.

Don’t wait until you have all the acceptable answers before you open your life to God and love Him with all your heart. No one on this side of heaven will ever have all the answers. If you wait until you get your life to a point where you think you are “living properly” before you earnestly seek God, then you are missing out on the greatest single joy of life here on Earth--to be one with your Creator. You can have that right now! At this exact moment! You don’t need to have any particular belief to know there is a God and that you want to get to know Him. So why not just do it? You may not even know if you are a Christian, but if you can believe that God loves you enough to sacrifice His Son, Jesus, then I can tell you that you are a Christian and you can just relax about the things you don’t know or understand. Your relationship will grow and He will make it more clear every day that Jesus is real and knows you by name.

Here’s a suggestion, an example of what you can say to God. The point is to talk to Him as you would to a friend you know who cares about you: “God, I know you exist and there are times I feel I could just talk to you. I don’t have all the answers and I’m not sure if I believe what other people are telling me, but what I do know is that I want to know you! Not necessarily the you that everyone else tells me about, but the you that knows me and knows what I need in order to have a relationship with you. I trust you to help me know you and I can’t wait to just hang out and become closer to you than I could have ever imagined.”

Now, knowing that God is full of love and ready to have that relationship with you, do you think He is going to say, “Nope, not until you can admit that you understand and believe everything”?

Proverbs 8:17 - I love those who love me, and those that seek me find me.

Jeremiah 29:13 - You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all of your heart.

Matthew 6:33 - But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.

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We don’t really seek Him by simply saying we fully believe the story, say the prayer, and start going through the steps and getting involved in church. Those are all great things to do, but God is not a mail-order bride. We can't simply follow directions, pay the dues, and now we have a long-term relationship. He is the creator of love and those that seek Him will do so in Spirit.

The only way we will make that connection is when we lay aside our doubts and fears and come to Him as a child, with none of the answers, simply raising our hands up for Him to hold us and love us. How precious it is to love like a child and be loved by the strongest, safest Father of them all!

It is my prayer that you have seen through the eyes of the Spirit of God as you read this book and know that God wants a relationship with you more than your religious acts. He wants you to do things out of a heart full of His Spirit and an ear open to hear what He has to say. Doing things out of obligation and guilt is the opposite of what God wants, so my final hope for you is that you don’t find your richness in the things that you do or through material success, but in your knowing that you are a child of God with a God-given purpose.

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