Nearly 9 p.m. and it feel so much later. This whole daylights saving time really upsets the inner clocks for the first couple of weeks.
Now, before we begin, I wanted to tell you folks, the ones sending comments to me via Facebook and Twitter, I'm not receiving them and so, I haven't responded and for this I do apologize. If you wish to comment on my blog, my book or even my writing style- negative or positive, the best way is to contact me at my e-mail address of [email protected] . I will respond as soon as I can.
Now that storm we was all feared of, is either really slow for hurricane winds or its by-passed us completely. We're only getting some rain and light to moderate winds over the next 4 days. But warning are still going out for the Lower 48. I'm now wondering if we will have any real snow by Thanksgiving and so is my snowplow driver.
I went to church today, Pastor had a great word and he discussed Apostle Paul, who in his latter life as a Christian still admitted to being a sinner- mainly because he was human and imperfect- a "wretched soul". Pastor, a major history buff, spoke as if Paul was was an old friend from high school.
If any of your ever read or watched the movie, "Cross and the Switchblade", which is the true story of a country pastor who went into the violent streets of gangland New York, spiritually driven to reach out to these gangs. Eventually through his crusade and God's protection, he was used to bring Nicki Cruz, a hardened and dangerous gang warlord, to the Lord. I once heard Cruz speak in a college gym, now being used as a weapon against the enemy instead of other gangs, while Pastor David Wilkerson, the young pastor, went on to be used by the Lord to bring thousands of people to the Lord's army. He came to Fairbanks and Mona and I went to hear him speak, but I was not ready yet, my time came a year or so later.
The Lord chose one of the street's worst characters and used David to reach out to him and his transformation from a violent criminal to a Christian, who was now cleaning himself up from drugs, alcohol and other sins, drew a lot of other gang members to the Lord. Nicki's testimony was a strong one. I used a memory of that in my new book to come, "Apache Snow".
In a lot of ways David and Nicki's story was a repeat of Saul's character 2,000 years before. Saul, a strict Jew, took it upon himself to slay the Christians and he often did so in many heinous ways. After Jesus was crucified and had risen from the dead, Saul would experience a run-in with him- actually only His voice. Jesus blinded him and gave him instructions on what he must carry out to have sight again, where to go and who would care for him. When the miracles had finished, Saul, who would soon be called the Apostle Paul, was a new man and totally behind the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul wrote more Books in the New Testament than any other writer. I can only imagine this same type of story was carried out again and again over these last 2,000 years. Jesus would take the worst among us and transform our lives to demonstrate to others that Christianity was true and alive.
Paul had an unbelievable testimony, we now read of it in the Bible. Pastor David Wilkerson has passed from this world to now walk with the Lord in the next. I don't know about Nicki. If and when his time comes and his marching orders are given, I am sure there will be a lot of people up in heaven who will want to shake his hand to say thank you for his sharing of his testimony and working with crisis counseling and anti-drug work.
Most of the time, guest speakers never get to see how many or who comes to the Lord at the end of a meetings. They usually leave that for the local pastors. People like David or Nicki were not interested in numbers, but in getting the Lord's message out to the public. Both of them were also heavily involved in street ministry, too.
I've heard it said that on an average a non-Christian hears the Lord's invitation 7 times before he asks the Lord into his life, and we may never know if we're the 2nd or the 6th agent of the Lord. But maybe we're the 7th and wow, we witness the awe inspiring act occur as the person releases his past sinful life to the Lord and a softness suddenly appears in their eyes. But always be prayed up yourselves, because you could be in for a tough battle with the enemy. The dark one doesn't like losing his slaves to the Christ.
Our numbers here are not large, but we have a good group and guests are always made to feel like family. We end our service with a hot lunch and fellowship. Our drummer got to work out on his new electronic drum kit and the various sounds coming out of it, changed after each song, I found fascinating. I set on an electric set about 23-24 yrs ago and thought it sounded dead. They've come a long way. Grant, a nice young man who hangs around here quite a lot, was playing my congas. I've moved aside, but keep my percussion set-up remained on the stage. The house didn't have room for it. This is a young man's game anyway. I'll probably take up mouth harp, like another old geezer I know, but he's pretty hot. Maybe banging pans, I get the bears to runaway at least.
I did have a mess of news briefs, but I'll devote a blog to them tomorrow. You know we did have a cool thing happen this week, a brother-in-law we have not seen for sometime made contact online wondering about my book. I replied and then he replied, which caused me to send him a 35-page e-mail to get him up to date with our family. Now, we may never hear from him again. I simply have this desire to write...as you can see. Plus I am working on my new book and planning on another. Seems my mind never slow down. Now the body, it gave up sometime ago, but my mind is caught in 1971, when I was 17-18. Makes me understand why there are so many dirty old men out there. Their minds are frozen and they're not mature enough to live with it and find other outlets. Now you know why so many old geezers build plastic models, at least now they can read the instructions and they no longer want to sniff the glue out of their dirty socks.
I used to bust glue sniffers in the military, then it became gas sniffers- who were so much more violent...and cocaine. Amazing what people snort up their noses. Gas sniffers sometimes died, like coke addicts. We just try real hard at making fools of ourselves and all too often we get the brass ring by not waking up again in the ER.
I'd better quit or I'll get into another story. So, I will say good night and do hope you have had a nice weekend. Enjoy the week ahead, be-careful with your money. love your wife and kids....God Bless, BILL
Now, before we begin, I wanted to tell you folks, the ones sending comments to me via Facebook and Twitter, I'm not receiving them and so, I haven't responded and for this I do apologize. If you wish to comment on my blog, my book or even my writing style- negative or positive, the best way is to contact me at my e-mail address of [email protected] . I will respond as soon as I can.
Now that storm we was all feared of, is either really slow for hurricane winds or its by-passed us completely. We're only getting some rain and light to moderate winds over the next 4 days. But warning are still going out for the Lower 48. I'm now wondering if we will have any real snow by Thanksgiving and so is my snowplow driver.
I went to church today, Pastor had a great word and he discussed Apostle Paul, who in his latter life as a Christian still admitted to being a sinner- mainly because he was human and imperfect- a "wretched soul". Pastor, a major history buff, spoke as if Paul was was an old friend from high school.
If any of your ever read or watched the movie, "Cross and the Switchblade", which is the true story of a country pastor who went into the violent streets of gangland New York, spiritually driven to reach out to these gangs. Eventually through his crusade and God's protection, he was used to bring Nicki Cruz, a hardened and dangerous gang warlord, to the Lord. I once heard Cruz speak in a college gym, now being used as a weapon against the enemy instead of other gangs, while Pastor David Wilkerson, the young pastor, went on to be used by the Lord to bring thousands of people to the Lord's army. He came to Fairbanks and Mona and I went to hear him speak, but I was not ready yet, my time came a year or so later.
The Lord chose one of the street's worst characters and used David to reach out to him and his transformation from a violent criminal to a Christian, who was now cleaning himself up from drugs, alcohol and other sins, drew a lot of other gang members to the Lord. Nicki's testimony was a strong one. I used a memory of that in my new book to come, "Apache Snow".
In a lot of ways David and Nicki's story was a repeat of Saul's character 2,000 years before. Saul, a strict Jew, took it upon himself to slay the Christians and he often did so in many heinous ways. After Jesus was crucified and had risen from the dead, Saul would experience a run-in with him- actually only His voice. Jesus blinded him and gave him instructions on what he must carry out to have sight again, where to go and who would care for him. When the miracles had finished, Saul, who would soon be called the Apostle Paul, was a new man and totally behind the Lord Jesus Christ. Paul wrote more Books in the New Testament than any other writer. I can only imagine this same type of story was carried out again and again over these last 2,000 years. Jesus would take the worst among us and transform our lives to demonstrate to others that Christianity was true and alive.
Paul had an unbelievable testimony, we now read of it in the Bible. Pastor David Wilkerson has passed from this world to now walk with the Lord in the next. I don't know about Nicki. If and when his time comes and his marching orders are given, I am sure there will be a lot of people up in heaven who will want to shake his hand to say thank you for his sharing of his testimony and working with crisis counseling and anti-drug work.
Most of the time, guest speakers never get to see how many or who comes to the Lord at the end of a meetings. They usually leave that for the local pastors. People like David or Nicki were not interested in numbers, but in getting the Lord's message out to the public. Both of them were also heavily involved in street ministry, too.
I've heard it said that on an average a non-Christian hears the Lord's invitation 7 times before he asks the Lord into his life, and we may never know if we're the 2nd or the 6th agent of the Lord. But maybe we're the 7th and wow, we witness the awe inspiring act occur as the person releases his past sinful life to the Lord and a softness suddenly appears in their eyes. But always be prayed up yourselves, because you could be in for a tough battle with the enemy. The dark one doesn't like losing his slaves to the Christ.
Our numbers here are not large, but we have a good group and guests are always made to feel like family. We end our service with a hot lunch and fellowship. Our drummer got to work out on his new electronic drum kit and the various sounds coming out of it, changed after each song, I found fascinating. I set on an electric set about 23-24 yrs ago and thought it sounded dead. They've come a long way. Grant, a nice young man who hangs around here quite a lot, was playing my congas. I've moved aside, but keep my percussion set-up remained on the stage. The house didn't have room for it. This is a young man's game anyway. I'll probably take up mouth harp, like another old geezer I know, but he's pretty hot. Maybe banging pans, I get the bears to runaway at least.
I did have a mess of news briefs, but I'll devote a blog to them tomorrow. You know we did have a cool thing happen this week, a brother-in-law we have not seen for sometime made contact online wondering about my book. I replied and then he replied, which caused me to send him a 35-page e-mail to get him up to date with our family. Now, we may never hear from him again. I simply have this desire to write...as you can see. Plus I am working on my new book and planning on another. Seems my mind never slow down. Now the body, it gave up sometime ago, but my mind is caught in 1971, when I was 17-18. Makes me understand why there are so many dirty old men out there. Their minds are frozen and they're not mature enough to live with it and find other outlets. Now you know why so many old geezers build plastic models, at least now they can read the instructions and they no longer want to sniff the glue out of their dirty socks.
I used to bust glue sniffers in the military, then it became gas sniffers- who were so much more violent...and cocaine. Amazing what people snort up their noses. Gas sniffers sometimes died, like coke addicts. We just try real hard at making fools of ourselves and all too often we get the brass ring by not waking up again in the ER.
I'd better quit or I'll get into another story. So, I will say good night and do hope you have had a nice weekend. Enjoy the week ahead, be-careful with your money. love your wife and kids....God Bless, BILL
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