If I ever needed someone to cross my path it was yesterday, and God definitely knew it. I have been out of the blogging loop for a few months now simply because I had gotten so caught up with the blessing of being promoted to a co-manager of a retail store that I had no time for anything else. Relationships with friends, family, and my girlfriend all were not getting much quality time as an investment. (Yes, I said girlfriend! For those of you following my blog only and are now lost, I found the love of my life on Halloween night last year and couldn't be happier! That story to come later. ;D) Since taking the position, I resigned from my position as a Youth Pastor and got to experience, firsthand, what people meant by rebutting against my continual badgering about getting a job that doesn't keep you out of church; from September till the new year, I had only been to around three worship services. That's tricky for a guy that had always been so adamant about never working on Sundays! On top of it all, I slowly caused my health to deteriorate to the point of not being able to breathe. My body had been placed in an environment of constant stress and lack of rest. Music ministry became nonexistent as well, and my smile was barely definable underneath the constant feeling of fighting for my life.
I had to let go.
Letting go of the co-manager position meant returning to part time with around 15 to 20 hours a week at just a little over Missouri's minimum wage. In Illinois, that's practically considered unemployed, but the choice was as obvious as Jonah's as he sat in the belly of that giant fish. God wants me to be spiritually fed and to carry on His call in my life for music ministry. This is the season I am in.
When I have a need for a place to sleep at night, food on the table, transportation to get back and forth, and a way to stay connected, not knowing where a solid income will come from is a scary place to be. Being one that has been there many times, I really drudged experiencing it again.
A scarier place to be is where God isn't.
When I made the decision to step down, things really changed. My health almost immediately cleared up, communication with friends has reopened, God has placed a lot of opportunities in my life for pursuing talents as a musician, more quality time with Amanda, my beautiful and talented girlfriend, has strengthened our relationship, and who knows where the future will take us! ;)
Those blessings give me confidence in God, and gives me hope for my future, but it doesn't clear up the questions. I cannot continue to live under the roof of host families all of my life, I have to be able to afford transportation, home-cooked meals have not really been an option for me and needs to be, staying connected through social medias is a must for a music career, and nothing in our lost world is free.
Here's where the story of Bill begins.
I am sitting in McDonalds of Fairview Heights, Illinois, studying a road map of Illinois because I have this brilliant idea of how to be crafty with it and find a way to make wall decorations out of it to sell as merchandise on my website (a work in progress) because we are all going somewhere and what a better way to express how we all are connected as the Body of Christ along this path to somewhere than to hang clips of roadmaps on your wall?!? Basically, I am desperate to come up with a more supportive income as a starving, homeless musician that works 15 hours a week selling shoes.
This elderly man walks up in a coat made for a man twice as tall as he is, and a hat that may have been picked up as a free giveaway at a home or business expo. With a softness in his voice, he calmly asks if he can take a few minutes to burn away some of my time, of which if you've read any of my blog at all you know I automatically knew God had sent this man into my life for this moment and I could not refuse to listen.
Bill told me his story.
History.
...whichever you decide to call it.
Bill served for 17 years in the Navy firing giant artillery from the decks of ships during World War 2. One cold night his ship was hit and the captain made the decision for everyone to jump. If his captain had made the call any later, there would not have been enough time for Bill to swim far enough away from the ship to not get sucked under by the massive tons of metal sinking to the ocean floor, and he would not have made it out to be able to tell me his story in McDonalds yesterday.
After serving a while in the Navy, the reserves split and formed the opportunity to be a part of an air force, so he inquired about being transferred in to serve in a new capacity. As it turned out, they found him a perfect candidate to come up with tactics for getting troops in and out safely, to make sure as few lives as possible were lost. Bill did not have much of an education because his father was a farmer that had told him, "You don't need any other education than what you get at home. If you have any questions you can ask me. I have all the answers you'll need with my third grade education." Back then all you needed to know was how to tend the family farm.
Because Bill grew a desire to learn, he ended up using his experience and knowledge from extended training to save thousands of lives with a tactic that rescued troops from the line of fire in Vietnam. He received metals for his heart, of which he questioned because he never knew he had saved so many lives till they told him about how his plan worked.
Bill has two daughters. One has been called to the mission field several times and recently felt the need to take supplies to villages in Africa. He and his other daughter agreed to support her cause by donating what they could in non-perishable foods and other goods. Bill was able to to round up about $100 in groceries, and his daughter managed to talk companies and retailers into donating a total of around $21000 in goods to send over. She agreed to pay for the donations to be shipped over seas and away Bill's daughter went to hand deliver them, because she wanted to make sure they would all get to the right people. Both of Bill's daughters have blessed him with grandchildren, all of which are being brought up with the same kind of heart for thinking of others before themselves.
Bill told me about being baptized in a Baptist church, but that his faith in Christianity was tarnished by a TV evangelist that he had come to respect one day proclaiming that you were nothing unless you belonged to a Baptist church. After turning off the TV, he began to turn to research other religions and came to the conclusion that not one of them were perfect, but all had good morals woven in and believed in positive things. God opened the door right there for me to share with him the God I serve is higher than any religion, and this Creator of all wants a personal relationship with Him instead of just being a Ruler of our lives. He listened with respect, and with tears in his ears told me he was glad we crossed paths.
Then Bill said something to me that has changed the way I am looking at life. He said through everything he has been through - coming back from service and feeling like "home" wasn't really home anymore after being gone so long at sea, and 20 years ago loosing his wife to cancer - he has learned that there are many ways to do things, and when we feel like we've found the best way to do something, someone else will come along soon and find a way to do it even better. But his message was clear: always look for new ways to learn, and be one to make a change. This is the statement he made that sticks with me:
"Try, try, try again. When that doesn't work, flip it over and look at it from the other side. Then try, try, and try again."
I will not give up. When God nudges, it's time to move.
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