I somewhat broke out of my shell in college. Which unfortunately led me to a life of partying. I tried marijuana, but never got hooked with it. It was always more of just an occasional social thing. But smoking and drinking all weekend would be something that stuck around for awhile. The partying lifestyle stopped shortly before my first child was born. This is also where my spiritual journey began. For many years I jumped from one theory to the next. Following more rabbit holes than I'd like to admit. I can look back now and know that I learned much about the inner meanings of the bible from this journey. But there was still a huge vacant space in my soul that ached constantly.
It was an ache that sent me down a very dark path. My depression and self worth were so low, I contemplated taking my life on numerous occasions. I had so much more than most do, yet I felt like I had nothing. I had a wonderful wife and kids. A great family structure that would help me through anything, but still I was lost. I had no purpose; or at least I felt I had no purpose. I felt as though if I just ended it then I could be home and away from the darkness of this world. I never considered if God would forgive me for doing it, I just knew that was an escape. I knew it would be devastating to my family, but in the state I was in, I felt they would be better off.
It wasn't until five years ago this September that a change would begin. On vacation at the beach with my family, I broke down one day and just cried out to God. "God I can't do this anymore. I need a purpose. Please show me what you want me to do."I was led to open the bible and turned straight to the story of Moses in the wilderness. I said, "Ok God, you need to take me through the wilderness first." But like most of humanity, we don't exactly like to wait for things. Fast forward three years and I was approaching my 40th birthday. In my mind the numbers forty and three were very symbolic and I thought they had meaning. Emphasis on I thought. Well the fortieth passed and no change was in sight.
Then the Friday, two weeks before Thanksgiving something happened. I was at work sitting in my office, once again reveling in my depressed mind. When I saw a very large man come to the front door on the security camera. He began to pound on the intercom button and I just said, "Please God I don't want to deal with this today!" Then the secretary called me and said the man had a meeting with the Pastor. So as I am walking to the door I'm on the phone with the campus pastor asking if he had a meeting today. As I open the door I ask the man who he is here to see. He replied that he just needed to talk with a Pastor. The whole time I am on the phone he continues to shake his head. Before I can tell him anything he says, "You know it's bad when you have to schedule a meeting to talk to a pastor." I agreed with him, but told him he was welcome to go to our other campus and someone could speak with him.
He said, "I just needed someone to pray with me, you can do that can't you?" Now folks with my social anxiety, even doing this in a one-on-one scenario was frightening. But I did it. He begins to tell me his story. He was a preacher from Texas, but had lost his way. He had lost his job, his family, and everything. But he had turned back to the Father and was getting back on his feet. He then asked for gas money. At this point my human nature kicked in, "Ok this is what he wanted all along, money. If I give him some than I can get back to my loathing." I reached into my pocket to get some money and he said,"I don't want to take your last ten dollars." Now that made me stop for a second because one: ten dollars is all I had in my pocket and two: It's all the money I had period. I said, "No don't worry about that," and handed it to him.
He continued to talk about his depression and at one point I start to see similarities in our lives. I said that I feel the same way and am going through that to. He says, "Your not listening." And I continue to speak and he says it again, "Your not listening." At this point I'm wondering if I didn't hear something he had said. Then finally a third time, (there's that number again) he said, "You don't understand you're not listening." "Don't you know when your grandfathers passed away they passed the mantle to you to take the Father's message to the world?" So yeah, at this point I started to feel my knees go out and the emotions starting to build. But even with this overwhelming occurrence happening right before me, I still continued to debate. I said, "Yes but what I'm battling is in my head. It's forces unseen by others." He said,"Yes, don't you understand that's why the Father was with your sister that night she was battling these forces?"
Folks, I literally could not feel my body at this point. I didn't know if I was dreaming or if what was happening was a reality. He continued to speak, "You aren't going to reach people here. You must go to the parks, steps of the courthouse, or stadiums and proclaim God's word. That's where you will reach them. And don't worry, we know you have a problem speaking in public. But when you begin to speak, it won't be you speaking; it will be the Father speaking through you." My mind was not able to comprehend much at this point. He said, "I'm glad the Father sent me a carpenter instead of a Pastor," and thanked me and began to walk off. I said, "I'm sorry I have always had a problem remembering names, did you tell me your name?" He said, "My name is Abel."
This is when I knew that what had happened was real. When he started walking off my human nature kicked back in. Or what I feel was Satan, realizing he was losing and told me to keep an eye on him. I wanted to see him get into a car, and see if the tag was from Texas. I saw him walk between two cars. Apparently I had not seen one of the preschool teachers come out. When the car backed up, the teacher was the one driving the car. Abel had literally disappeared. Trust me I know how this sounds. It was unbelievable then, and I still have difficulties now still believing. But God has a way of reminding me; just like He did three times after this, so that I knew it was his hand. The other teacher and the lady in the office saw me overcome with emotion; and all I could say was that, "I believe I just had a conversation with an Angel."
The first time God re-affirmed what had happened was the next day. We were at my mother's house. She had just sold one of my grandparent's houses. It hadn't sold for much because it was a very old house, but she felt we should have a part of it. She gave me a card, and inside was a check for one thousand dollars. You might be saying, "Well how was that affirmation of what happened the day before?" Matthew 13:23 But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” You see that 1,000 dollar check was exactly one hundred fold from what I gave Abel. I gave all I had, and He returned a hundred fold. Praise God!
If that wasn't enough to make me believe, He affirmed it again a second time, the very next day. I had to work on that Sunday. I was talking to the Children's Minister and relaying the story from the day before. When I was telling the story, I had remembered in talking about my depression with Abel, that I had said I was obviously well fed and that I should be thankful for that. Abel had said as he was touching his stomach,"Yeah, me too but I don't have to worry about that now." I didn't understand it at the time, but God showed the affirmation again. The children's minister told me a missionary she knew had just told her a week before, that one of the missionaries they had worked with, had passed away with his six year old boy. He was a Pastor from Texas, that had just recently became a missionary in Africa. He and his son had died from an infection in their stomachs. His name was Abel. Now I don't claim to know God's ways. I don't think this was actually that pastor that came to me that day. I feel He used that, to affirm to me about my time with His messenger.
The third and final time He affirmed it was again the very next day. In a conversation with my sister, and the things she went through when she was battling her forces; she told me of things she saw and heard, that were exactly the same things Abel had told me. I knew at this point, without a shadow of a doubt, that God had given me my marching orders. But I didn't know in what context. A verse started to weigh on me.
Matthew 25:34-40 “Then the king will say to those on his right, ‘Come, my Father has blessed you! Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the creation of the world. I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger, and you took me into your home. I needed clothes, and you gave me something to wear. I was sick, and you took care of me. I was in prison, and you visited me.’ “Then the people who have God’s approval will reply to him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you or see you thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you as a stranger and take you into our homes or see you in need of clothes and give you something to wear? When did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ “The king will answer them, ‘I can guarantee this truth: Whatever you did for one of my brothers or sisters, no matter how unimportant they seemed, you did for me.’
So I felt His calling was to help those society had left behind. But like so many of us, I didn't wait for direction. I ripped that verse out of the bible and began my Olympic 40 yard dash to make it a reality. All the while, God was patiently waiting at the starting line, for me to realize I needed Him. So when it failed, and it did, He gave the direction. Yes all the grandiose plans I had would come to fruition, but teaching is where He wanted me to start. So I started this blog based teaching site. Now I can't say results came overnight, because they didn't. Seven months in and the blog had ten followers. But you see I was more concerned with quantity instead of quality. I wanted to reach as many people as I possibly could. While that is a noble aspiration, I was relying on what I thought, not what He did. So I said, "Ok Lord, I will continue to teach if only one person reads and is reached for the kingdom. Let your will be done." So for three months,(wow, that number just won't stop coming up) I didn't pay attention to the quantity, just His quality.
After three months He laid a pressing on me to check the blog. In October there were over 700 followers in three countries. Praise God! Mediocre numbers by worldly status, but abundant numbers in the Kingdom of Christ. As the months have passed I have tried to keep my view on what His will is. As we are entering the third month of 2018, the blog now has 10,000 plus followers in over 25 countries. Nothing, and I mean Nothing is impossible with God.
You see, I have been a virtual nobody my entire life, but that is just what God wants. When someone with social anxiety can become a booming voice for Him, then His power is shown. All through the Bible, people with issues have been used for the Kingdom. Shy, stuttering, unknown sinful people have always been used for God's Kingdom. He didn't choose the self proclaimed spiritually righteous. He didn't choose the wealthy, conceited rulers. No He chose the ones who felt they were nothing; because through Him they are more than something. He has raised the lowest in the kingdom of this world, to be the highest in the Kingdom of Christ. Just know; it doesn't matter if you have social anxiety, it doesn't matter your race, it doesn't matter where you come from in life, and it doesn't matter how far you may have sunken in the darkness. All of you are loved, and all of you are made for something far greater than you could ever imagine. Christ only sees your heart, not your self perception. He sees what you were created to be.
