He is real and he loves us, first.
Posted
by
humbertob1 on
7/4/2008 3:12:05 PM
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I began drinking when I was ten years old when I was selling newspapers and shining shoes in the bars. I was a teenage alcoholic, dope smoker, and heroin user by the time I entered Jr. High school. I quit school at the beginning of the tenth grade, I don't remember any classes.
I was sent to prison for stealing a car,trying to avoid being sent to Vietnam, at the age of seventeen, in 1967. I recieved my GED as an option to picking cotton on a prison farm in Texas. I also learned the trade of welding. I was released at age nineteen.
I got married at age twenty-one. I had my first, of three children and I bought my first house, in Denver, Colorado at age twenty-three, where I had become a Boilermaker, a builder of Powerplants. I bought my second house, a five bedroom, five acre ranchette, between Denver and Colorado Springs, five years later.
I had everything that the "American Dream" promised to anyone who would give glory and homage to a secular government. I did so. I did not give glory to the One whom I had never gave any consideration to.I did not give thanks to any body on earth. I worked for mine, I deserved what I worked hard for, I thought. I ate, drank, and was merry. I drank too much!
When my Christian wife infromed me that my repsonsiblities were not being met and that the good times were about to come to an end, I screamed at her, telling her that I was the king of that home and that the house, the cars, the horses, the children and indeed her, herself, was mine to do with what I wanted. I was the Boss, ther head honcho, the wise one of the family!! But in her wisdom, she told me that the grocery bag on the floor, filled with "my" clothes was the only thing that I possessed, and that I was to leave the family and to never return.
I thought to myself, I would leave and it would be to her suffering for my loss. That was 35 years ago. I have not recieved a "come back home" call.
Deppresion set in so badly that I wanted to kill myself. I was returned to prison, 20 years later, again. I was paroled to Austin, Texas, where I resumed a drug addiction, fed by my stealing everyday from grocery stores to support my addiction.
I became homeless for ten years, with three years under a bridge, smoking crack, everyday. My life was slipping away from me, right before my eyes. I did not call on God, I did not know God, but God called on me because He knows me, He knows my heart and he had mercy on a lonely fool, a prodigal son, just one of His flock.
I was blinded in one eye by syphlis from years earlier. I developed Diabetis, hypetitus C, and was suffering from cirrosis of my liver. I could now see my life slipping away before my eyes. I was hit by a car. My body smashed that car as if it had hit a oak tree, but I only recieved a bruised leg. As I bent over to pick up my boosting box( my thieving tool)I heard a voice telling me that the next time; I would not get up again. I was filled with a desire to find out who had said that.., and what did it mean by"next time". This led me to a Salvastion Army Adult Rehab. center. There I discovered the treasure of the Bible. The studies began to answer questions that I had not spoken of. I fell in love when I read the verse," ask, and it will be given unto you, seek and you will find, knock, and the door will be opened". First I doubted. I asked for wisdom and knowledge, I had grown so tired of being a fool, in my old age. I found that I was asking for knowlege of Him, for I knew about things of this world, I've been here 59 years, and the wisdom that I asked for was always right there, in the Bible.
He bought me books and sent me to school.
I recieved a cornia transplant, a 10,000 operation for free.My sight has been returned to me. My diabetis is in control, my cirrosis is in remission, and the Hyp. C is also in remission. He has shown Himself to me, in the things that He does in my life that I can now see and hear, and I now give glory to ONLY Him. He shows me the way to keep learning, even though the obstacles are everywhere, after all it is impossible for an old man, who dropped out of school forty years ago, who is living under a bridge as a homeless crack addict, who never went to high school. It is NOT impossible for the One who makes the impossible, possible. He made the funds available, along with my housing and my food needs. I also now drive a new scooter!
I recieved an associates degree, after applying the GED that I recieved forty years ealier in prison. I applied that degree when applying for my Bachelors' degree, in Ministry and Christian Studies, where I will be in my junior year this fall,'08.
I continue to ask questions, but I seek answers from scholars. I pray for answers that even scholars can not answer, and I recieve understanding. I realize that an uneducated child can recieve revelation, but 59 years of human reasoning has it's difficulties in being set aside from a person who has been so self reliant, for so long. I will never know everything, but what I am able to see and to hear, I will share with my brothers and sisters in the Prison Ministry, where I do volunteer, thank you Jesus.
Our Father who art in heaven, the One who loved us brfore we were even in our mother's womb, Thank you for carrying me for so long. I pray to walk now in His footsteps, by His grace. Amen.
Speak to Him. Say your prayers. He hears our words. He does love us, all. Can we not love Him for all that He has done for us in our lives? To suffer means that we are alive. To recieve His mercy must be for His glory, because He is the Creator. Living things that do not suffer, even unto death, do not exist. He overcomes suffering and death, for US!!
