Smelling the roses!

On our journey so far we have met some wonderful people. And most of the time we met them in times of trouble were I was forced to stop and look around. One such instance happened when I needed to light the water heater for the first time, unlike those at home an RV water heater has an open flame and looked completely foreign to me. So just to make sure I wasn't going to blow up our home I asked a couple of ladies that were staying a crossed from us if they knew anything about it. They did, and the RV was safe. This started what ended up being an ongoing friendship. Over the next few days we talked several times and learned lots about Florida cotton and life on the road in general. When we were getting ready to leave they came over and gave us there contact info and said to stop by if we are ever in there neck of the woods. Now we never quoted scripture or called them to make a choice for God right there, but we did spend allot of time talking with them about lots of things including God and his church. They had been hurt by people that called themselves Christians in the past and that wound was still festering in them; hopefully God used us to heal that wound and to start calling them back to him.

There was also a ministry that we came across that is doing some amazing things for the people of Florida. When we left we had less time to organize than we had hoped because of dealing with the vandalism on our house. As a result we had more in our RV than we had hoped for. (Not quite as bad as an episode of hoarders, but pretty close!) As a result we have been purging things that we don't need along the way. One set of purging led us to a thrift store named "Well of Hope thrift store" we walked in to make a donation and were blown away by the servants we found there. This store is run by a couple who are both pastors of a local church. They have the thrift store there to help fund the food pantry that they run. In talking with the pastor he said that the only reason he has a thrift store is so he can meet people to pray with and keep the food pantry well funded. While I was there I saw them pray for three or four different people and bless others with free stuff not to mention offering us a free turkey to take with us (it was a couple of days before thanksgiving.)

Now there were other people on the way that we met and talked with and that we are still talking to, the point of these to stories is to make me remember and maybe help some of you to stop and talk to people. If you make yourself available to people you will learn about them and hopefully minister to them as well. I know this is the journey God has me on, when we started out God had me read a story in Genesis where he told Abraham to go to the place He would show him and that through him God would bless the nations. Now I don't mean by this that I believe that we will be a big name or known to really anyone but our friends and family but rather that God can use us to bless people everywhere we go. I believe that is what God wants from all of us everyday, as the saying goes, stop and smell the roses. Don't be so focused on your schedule that you miss that person who is hurting and really needs someone to talk to. Until next time, may God give you a fresh perspective of those around you everyday.

The road we travel

Ok, so I decided that I have to post some of the crazy things that have happened to us on the road so far. I know that God has used all of this stuff to get us where we are now, where is that you ask? Well I'll tell you, we are in Richmond Virginia. Now I now that is not Florida like I was at my last post or the Keys like we planned but after telling the story I'm sure it will all make sense in a crazy all over the place kind of way.

So back in Iowa we had our house rented out and trying to pack as fast as we could to be out by November first. Long story short, that didn't happen. Instead we found ourselves leaving Des Moines on the night of the second. One of our tires was low on the car dolly and had to be aired up and we went on our way, we made it about four blocks to the library when the tire on the dolly popped. So we pulled in to the library and proceeded to try to get BB and our boys out so they could go into the library while I changed the tire. That is when the wheelchair lift stopped working. After about a half hour of messing with it I was able to get her out in manual mode but barely got the lift closed again. Did I mention it was dark by this time and raining? Well after messing around with it for quite a while I finally got the tire changed and back on the road. We made it to BB's Dads house about one o’clock that night, and crashed almost immediately. The next day while looking at the ramp we realized that the dolly frame was bent and in the period of about 200 miles had removed almost all of the tread from the brand new tire. So with the help of some of BB's Dad's friends we got it straightened out and ready to go and it only took about three days. After finally getting to Orlando and hooking up the water we found out that there was a leak, evidently while putting in the new floor I had accidentally put a screw threw a water line. Two days and $250 later we had water. (We now have a new appreciation for silly little things like showers and drinking water.) That is when we discovered that our fridge didn't work so instead of being able to cook our own food like planned we had to eat out or eat only nonperishable food.
We had planned on doing what is called boon docking for allot of our time in Florida, (boon docking is when you park somewhere like a Wal-Mart over night with there permission. however we know now that Florida has strict rules against this and they will give you a $500 ticket if you are found boon docking anywhere. So after our exhausting 16 days at Disney we started out of town and stopped at an auto part store to pick up a few things. We realized after pulling in that they did not have a pull through type lot, to most people that isn't a big deal but to a guy driving a vehicle that measure about 58 feet long having to turn around is a big deal. While in the process of turning around the tong on the car dolly got bent bad enough that we could no longer pull our mini van on it. So feeling down and out but trying to make the best of a bad situation we visited a church the next day and looked around for ways to fix the car dolly. After failing at finding a fix we decided to continue on with our journey with BB driving the mini van and me the RV. That is when the last piece fell, a tire blew on the RV and I spent two hours in the rain at a gas station trying to put on the spare. We finally had to call a mobile auto company as six of the lug nuts just would not budge no matter how much wd-40 and beating on it I did. That was when BB and I looked at each other and agreed that we were almost out of money and frustrated beyond belief, so we called her uncle in Virginia and asked if we could come there for a while. We found out that BB's grandma was about to be transferred to hospice care and that they simply didn't know what would happen from there. We immediately pointed our grill to Richmond and got there as soon as we could. I believe that God let all that stuff happen so we would end up in Richmond where BB can spend as much time with her grandma as she wants and we are able to stay in her house while we are here. God always has a plan, we have been so blessed by the churches we have attended and know that God has us right where he wants us. The first church we went to have a guest speaker in that preached about being a servant wherever you are, if you serve people they will listen to you. So God has been reminding me daily to serve everyone I meet in any capacity that they allow. The second church we went to was here in Richmond and we plan on going back, we felt like the pastor knew our whole story, he talked about living a life that wasn’t concerned with being comfortable but rather following God in whatever he calls. I want to post again soon about some of the awesome people and ministry’s we met along the way but that will suffice for now. Until newt time may you find God on your journey in the sun or in the rain.

John 14:10

I have to go ahead and post this one as well even though I just posted moments ago. I am sitting at a star bucks in Orlando and it is so much easier to post while I am using wi-fi and I just reread verse 10 and I just have to share it. It is a little bit shorter than my previous post but just as powerful.

John 14:10 (The Message)

 ^9-10"You've been with me all this time, Philip, and you still don't understand? To see me is to see the Father. So how can you ask, 'Where is the Father?' Don't you believe that I am in the Father and the Father is in me? The words that I speak to you aren't mere words. I don't just make them up on my own. The Father who resides in me crafts each word into a divine act.

The Father who resides IN ME crafts each word into a DIVINE ACT. Praise God. That is my prayer in my life, that as I go forth on this journey of faith that God will breathe His words into me and pour them out to the people I meet and make it a divine act in there life. It makes me excited just to think about it. If we start going forth with this prayer on our lips imagine what God will do to every person we meet!

Father God, I just come to you right now and ask you to make the words I speak not mere words but that you who reside in me would craft each word into a divine act. Use me Father in this generation, do your works through me. Do not allow my flesh to get in your way, burn it our of me God. That I may follow you all the days of my life.

Until next time may Gods words be the ones you choose to speak.

John 14 verses 13 and 14

Ok, so first of all wow it's been a while! Since I last posted we have moved out and made it to Disney! So after 11 days of straight disney we are finnally taking a break..... for a day.

So back when we thought we would never get moved out of our house I was prayed for by a good friend and brother in the Lord and he told me to read John 14 and that I needed to realize who I am in Christ. Those turned out to be timely words as I received several revelations in that chapter that have definitely helped me in our journey.

The first thing that jumped out at me was in verses 13 and 14. It made me a little leery at first as I have most often heard those verses quoted by those in what I would call name it and claim it crowd. The people that I have had run ins with in this crowd always seemed to me to be more interested in what they can get from God rather than how they can serve Him. And then I read it in the message version of the Bible and it all came together.

John 14:13-14 (New International Version)

^“13 And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. ¹⁴ You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. “
This is the version I first read that made me nervous. Then I read.

John 14:13-14 (The Message)

From now on, whatever you request along the lines of who I am and what I am doing, I'll do it. That's how the Father will be seen for who he is in the Son. I mean it. Whatever you request in this way, I'll do.

Whatever you ask that lines up with who I am and what I am doing. That hit me like a ton of bricks, it’s not ask anything you want but rather if you are in line with God you can ask for anything that he would want for you and he will do it! I can’t tell you how much more confidence that gave me as I began to stand against the attacks of the enemy. I now know that I can petition daddy God to move the road blocks that I know are the devils work and He will do it.

I put this into immediate practice, over the next several days I started having pain in my hands that I had never had before, had to deal with the house vandalism plus getting us packed and out of the house just to name a few of the issues we faced. All of these were almost immediately resolved upon my knowing how to pray to my God. God is so good, he allows things to finally sink in that should have been realized years earlier. This is the first of the things that I learned in this chapter with more to come. Until next time may His love abound in your life today.

Joseph

For the past several days I have been reading and rereading Joseph's life in Genesis. The thing that stuck out to me more than anything was how long Joseph was in prison. Over and over it says some time later.... then two years later. Joseph must have been in prison for many years and yet he still trusted God to take care of him, and God did. I wish I could say that there is where the lesson ends, however this week has made me feel as though I were in prison for years. It started out simple enough, with a sink that wouldn't drain but after two days of being unable to yield any tangible results we called a sewer company to come take a look. I ended up calling the sewer company, the police and my insurance agent because we found out that our clogged pipe was the result of some neighborhood kids pouring rock into the sewer pipes on my roof. I can't begin to say the battle that raged in our hearts when realizing what had happened. But the fact of the matter is that this was just Satan trying desperately to distract us. The bible says in Romans 8:28 And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. (New International Version)
So, in the midst of our trials, we choose to praise the Lord. Daddy God will not let us fall. I know he has a plan and he will turn these trials into a testimony. Thank you God for taking care of us, You are so good. Until next time, God bless.

Follow me.

Luke 5:27-32 New International Version (NIV)
27 After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, 28 and Levi got up, left everything and followed him.
This verse has really been speaking to me lately. Jesus said two words in this verse. Two little words that would transform Levi's life. Follow Me. It seems to me that the entirety of our walk as Christians could be summed up with those words. Just follow Him! If He leads you to do something then do it. It really is that simple. Spend each day as though you were walking behind Jesus doing what he would do. That has really been on my heart for several days. Jesus would love each person he met, and I know he would give to that bum on the corner. In short I think Jesus spent his day in love. The only people he ever really chastised were his own disciples and the religious leaders. I think allot of times we get it backwards and give grace to the brothers and sisters in Christ and condemn the unsaved. Don't get me wrong, it is not our job to go around pointing out Christians mistakes but rather give them grace and guidance and NOT condemn the unsaved. We should be loving them not criticizing them for acting out who they are. After mulling this over for quite a while today I read the scripture and realized that it goes on from there. verses 29-31 say
^{29 Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. 30 But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”}
31 Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 32 I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”
It is not the healthy who need a doctor but the sick. I don't know about you, but I know where God is calling me to minister. This world is dying. There are people out there who need some hope, they need to feel loved. It is fine to go to church and minister and yes I know the bible even says not to forsake the gathering together of brothers. Go to church, get fed, worship your King. And then let's go show his love to a sick and dying world. Until next time, may his love shine forth in every step you take.

God is good

I am taken aback by just how good God is. I think allot of times we allow things to just kind of happen while we ran to keep up without ever stopping to realize how God is moving in our every day lives. Looking back over even just the last couple of months it is so easy to sense Gods hand in it all. We listed our house for rent three days ago and have showed it like six or seven times in there. Along the way we met some people that we liked and thought they could work and some people that we knew we would not want to have a key to our house. However over the past twenty four hours we have been stood up four separate times with no call or anything and we were starting to wonder if we should just pick one of the people that had previously looked at our home and then God brought the perfect family over. We knew almost upon meeting them that this was the family we would be offering our house to. Isn't God good! It is so easy to get caught up in the "how am I going to get all this done attitude" and then God steps in and reminds us that it's not us it's Him. When God calls you to something he makes it happen. Thank you Abba father. You truly are more awesome than words can express. Until next time, may you sense Gods hand at work in your life.

God speaks

I know we all have those times were we start to doubt that we heard God correctly or maybe even our sanity. One of those times happened yesterday. About two months ago in my prayer time I felt God say to me that we should put everything that we need in the rv and sell the rest at a garage sale. Now first of all I am not one that is usually a fan of garage sales. In general I think they take a ton of time and you end up with a tenth of what you had hoped for in the first place. So, when God said this I was willing but not overly excited as I approached BB with what I felt God was saying, the reception to what I was feeling was not shall we say a positive one. BB was not a fan of getting rid of everything because we still are unsure of how long we were to be gone. Now to be clear, she was not saying heck no God forget it but rather, sure we can sell most of it but it makes no sense to get rid of everything. She knew that God wanted us to travel and thus get rid of some of the unnecessary stuff but had her doubts on the authorship of an idea that struck so close to what I typically say when it comes to housework. ("This would be ten times easier if we didn't have all this crap!") So after about a month of going back and forth it finally came to a head yesterday with a conversation that ended with me taking a long walk around the block. On my walk God and I had a long talk in which I told him how crazy all this is and how we needed some sort of stability for our kids, decisions had to be made after all! At the end of my rantings where God could have easily put me in my place such as in Job 38:4 "Where were you when I laid the earth's foundation? Tell me, if you understand." But God in his grace didn't remind me how many times he has calmed my fears or how many confirmations he has given me. Instead Daddy God wrapped his loving arms around me as I walked and reminded me of the section of the bible he has been having me read lately. I have read and re-read the story of Abraham, God told him to pick up and leave and Abraham did as God called him to do. When I got home I looked at BB and told her what God had told me and that I was sure about what exactly God was asking of us but that she needed to know it for herself to. I handed her a bible and told her that God needed to speak to her also and not just to me and I went about my work. About fifteen minutes later she came back to me and said that God had given her the same word. So today we had our first of several garage sales preparing to selling everything that won't fit in the rv. And all I can say is that God is so Good. Not only did we sell most of what we put out there but we actually had multiple people come up to us through out the day asking specifically about things that we hadn't brought out to the sale. We ended up giving a couple of complete strangers tours of our house so they could see additional things that we hadn't even cleared of or emptied yet. All I can say is that when God calls you to something he blesses it and I can truly say that we have been blessed this day my Lord. Thank you Lord for your blessing that flow down to your children. Until next time, may his blessing overtake you and his character be revealed to you.

Just do it!

God had spoken, we were positive about that. We knew that He wanted us to travel. That sounds so simple doesn't it. Just one little word, travel. The list of things that needed to happen for us to travel was staggering. We started getting things done on the house and rv and were feeling pretty good about our progress for a while. Then we stopped looking at the goal and what God was doing and started looking at all the stuff that had to happen before we could simply travel. Looking back I feel somewhat like peter in
Matthew 14:29b-30 "Then Peter got down out of the boat, walked on the water and came toward Jesus. 30 But when he saw the wind, he was afraid and, beginning to sink, cried out, “Lord, save me!”"

We were doing what God had told us to do but we began to look at the waves of adversity in our lives and we began to sink. That was when we went to a friend of ours home church desperately hoping for a word from God to ensure us we were in fact on the right track. When we settled in our friend looked at the group and told us that God had been laying it on his heart all week that we all needed to pray for each other and give any words that God gave us. Just as in verse 31 of matthew 14 Jesus reached down his hand to us and set our feet on the path of his calling. Most of the people there had no idea what we had felt God tell us to do and yet every person there shared word after word that confirmed what God had been sharing with us. The one that sticks out the most was from a teenager who looked at us and said that she heard God saying "Just do it". After a night of confirmations that we were doing what God wanted we literally felt as though God had pulled us back onto the top of the see and the waves didn't feel quite so daunting anymore. Until next time, God bless.

A calling

Church, what does it mean? I have been going to "Church" my entire life and have had it defined several different ways. We are the church some would say, to others it is the building and still others would say the church is a bunch of hypocrites. The list could go on all night. My mind goes to the scripture in Mark 8:27 where Jesus asks the disciples who people say that he is. They went through a list of various options until finally Peter says in verse 29 that Jesus is the Christ. So, if Jesus asked you today who is my church, what is my church? How would you respond? I know that I too often would immediately flash back to some christian brothers and sisters that I have had a hard time loving, or some of the buildings in the area. But what does God say the church is?
Well, I looked it up. The word church is used over 100 times in the bible, and all but one use the same Greek word. Now if you are anything like me your first question is what's the deal with that one lonely greek word that was different? Well Acts 19:37 is that one, and it is simply talking about someone who robs from a church and that is the defined in that way. All the rest however are defined by strongs and several others as "A calling out".
The church is not a building, it is not a person or even a group of people. It is a calling. If you are a Christian then you are called. To what? What is my calling? That my friends is the question, what does God want me to do. To answer that I think we must again go back to scripture and ask what did Jesus do? Jesus set aside heaven to come here for us. Jesus healed the sick, spent time with the outcast and basically lived a life that was not his own. In my opinion, that is our calling. Mark 16:15 "He said to them, "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation."

Life goes on

I have never been a person who takes a pill for every headache or pain but at the beginning of this year I found all that had changed. I was suddenly taking the max doses of both tylenol and ibuprofen spread out through the day just to get the pain to a point to a manageable level. Work was out of the question, suddenly we found our families income plummet like a rock. And here is where God in all his kindness and love step into the middle of our families lives. You see one of the things that makes my family unique is the fact that BB is in a wheelchair and needs a certain amount of physical help from me. I literally couldn't pick up a ketchup bottle with my left hand at this point without screaming out in pain and yet I was able to meet every need of my wife's without the slightest problem. Philippians 4:19 says "My God will richly fill your every need in a glorious way through Christ Jesus." (Gods word translation) How awesome is God! I needed to be able to help my wife and God made it completely pain free.
During this time we also began to see that we really could live on much less than we had been. We started feeling God call us to a very different lifestyle. Instead of desiring more room and things we started realizing just how much excess we really had. Now I don't mean to make it sound like we were living in mansions and spending thousands a month on lattes, but we definitely had more than we needed. We began to realize that by constantly wanting more and bigger all of your time gets sucked into maintaining those things and achieving those things instead of reaching the world around you. I mean just stop and think if you no longer had a house payment or spent the time doing the fancy yard work how much money and time would you have to give to his kingdom? God very bluntly showed us that we were to focused on ourselves and our lives instead of who we could impact in our world today. Who you love Lord, I will love. Who you serve, I will serve. Until next time, may Gods heart become real in your life today.

The start

For quite a long time my family has had a desire to travel, in fact in one year we traveled from Iowa to texas three separate times. We had desired an rv but hadn't been able to find one that met our needs both physically and financially. When God supplied the rv at the price we could afford and with the perfect layout we felt like we were on cloud nine. But then the realization set in that to use this gas guzzler for anything more than a weekend trip over to the closest campsite would be almost impossible with our current financial goals and income. I specifically remember the end of a conversation we had about wondering if God was calling us to travel either full time or part time and my beautiful bride( henceforth referred to as BB) said to me "The only way I would even consider traveling is if for some reason you couldn't do your job anymore." Now I should clarify that I am self employed in a profession that although not requiring one to be in prime shape it does require you to lift and carry items weighing upwards of 50 pounds. "If for some reason you couldn't do your job anymore" Looking back I wish that little sentence had been worded differently. Like, The only way I will travel is if God tells us to and confirms it with a sign or something along those lines. But if you hadn't guessed no more than a couple of weeks after this comment I hurt my shoulder bad enough that I couldn't work anymore and required me to hire someone else to do it. God had our attention! Until next time may God's love become tangible and overwhelm you.

I will go

This is a blog whose purpose is to track the spiritual journey God has my family on. We are feeling called to a ministry in travel (though we don't know what exactly that means) that was spurred on late last year by the song by Chris Tomlin whose chorus goes " Where You go, I'll go. Where You stay, I'll stay. When You move, I'll move. I will follow You
Who You love, I'll love. How You serve I'll serve. If this life I lose, I will follow You". This song really started making us realize the calling to follow God anywhere, and that is why I am calling this blog "I_will_go".
I will follow You