…a new beginning in a new town with a fresh start.
The lord placed strong Christian people in my life. I flourished in my church and began to establish myself as a Christian man, working as a chef with a God-given talent to cook. I worked hard, too hard, and over time, got distracted by the rat race.
A year after coming to Savannah, I meet a wonderful women of God who I knew, from our first interaction, was ‘the one’. Our first encounter was a heated debate concerning biblical studies. Eighteen months later, we were married. Sadly, I had got so busy with my work and married life, that I forgot the core things Christ had taught me during my incarceration: study of his word; prayer; and seeking his will for our lives.
Men, be the man of God for your family that He has made you to be! Or suffer the consequences! Unfortunately, I fell short of this and my wife and I had begun to miss church using the excuse that Sunday was our only day off. I was under the delusion that I was strong enough, having come through the trials I had come through, to be ok out of fellowship with the body of Christ. I had the love of my life and was happy. Life was good!
What a profoundly prideful and stupid delusion that was! The further away from Him, the harder married life became. I wasn’t the spiritual head that my wife needed and it hurt her. As I grew more self-reliant, and less willing to read His word or pray, I lost my way.
Two events happened that should have drawn me back to Him. I know now, that He allowed them to happen for that very purpose, but instead of breaking, repenting, surrendering, as I had in jail, I hardened my heart without even realizing it. I had drifted far enough from His loving arms, that I felt I deserved what I was going through and would just have to endure the suffering and work it out on my own.
The first event was a work related injury. While cooking with vinegar, I severely damaged my lungs, a chemical burn from inhaling the acrid steam. Life got really hard, I was sick a lot, I had no energy and began to gain a lot of weight. After some time, this broke my spirit and I became a recluse. I hated to run into people who knew me, I hated to see their reaction to my physical change.
In 2003 my wife and I moved from Savannah to Florida, to take care of my grandfather. It was a hard thing to do but I couldn’t see anyway around it, he needed me, he had no one else. Day by day, my life got darker and I kept gaining weight. In short order, I was no longer the man that my wife knew and loved. I was a self-loathing recluse, distancing myself from my family, and especially my wife. It never occurred to me to turn to God in my misery, to cry out to Him for forgiveness and help to find my way back to Him..what a fool I was.
The second event, was that I all but lost my sight. My wife noticed I wasn’t seeing things like I should and insisted that I go to an eye doctor. So I went to the cheap eye doctor in the local mall. After 5 minutes of him trying to figure out why his instruments weren’t able to read the dimensions of my eyes, he handed me a card with the number of a specialist on it and walked me out the door, assuring me there was nothing he could do for me. Well, come to find out, I had a degenerative eye disease.
Still, I don’t seek God, but instead, I got harder and harder, more distant and lost. I shut my wife out and we simply existed, we had no life. We moved back to Savannah to be closer to her family because she was desperately lonely, I had become a sad person, closed off, even to those closest to me.
Sadly, the damage done by years of living without Christ as the center of our lives, took its toll and she left me. It was the saddest day of my life, but something clicked, and for the first time in a very long time, I cried out to God. He used the ONE thing that He knew would bring me back. I was broken and humbled, but I finally cried out to my Savior. I am truly sorry for not being the man of God that my wife needed me to be. Even though I’ve spent the last year and a half, getting my life back on track, walking with Him, back in fellowship with my church family, making His word the foundation of my life, my faith, praying for His will in my life, it was to late. She divorced me in March.
But, my God is a Mighty God and continuously blows my mind by how much he truly loves me. He has rekindled the fire in my heart for Him and His calling on my life. I am immersing myself in His love as He has surrounded me with wonderful Christian brothers and sisters. I am truly feeling His calling again and find little satisfaction in doing as the world does. I am done spinning my wheels in the world and am ready to devote my life to His calling.
Since my conversion, I have had a desire to work in the mission field, as did my wife. We had planned on fulfilling the Great Commission, together, until we lost our way. And now, he is giving me another opportunity to do just that. I wish she was at my side, taking this journey with me, but she is not, and I have accepted that fact.
About six months ago I went to my pastor to ask him to help me seek God’s direction for my life, and he had me start reading some specific books. Wild Goose Chase was the book that rekindled the fire in my heart to serve God and a have a heart for missions. In August, Jennilee, a young woman in my church, came home from her world race adventure (shout out to Q squad for her). I had met her before she had gone, but didn’t really know her, but she was good friends with the group of single adults that God had placed recently me in. After getting to know her better, she began to put the race bug in my heart so I sought God about weather or not it was what He wanted me to do and sure enough, it was! As I have continued to seek His will, He was shown me so much and has given me concrete confirmation so, by faith, I applied to the World Race, and the doors began to open.
So, here I am, preparing to be about His business, humbly allowing Him to take care of mine. I have such peace and am so excited to see God’s hand move in my life. I wanted to share with you, the events of my life that have lead me to this point, so that you can have a glimpse of the work He has done and is doing in my life and where He is leading me. This is only the beginning of a new chapter in my life, remembering the past and learning from my mistakes, but not allowing it to hinder my future. So I walk on, amazed by His grace and the love He has for me, indescribably thankful that He never gave up on me and has set me back on the path He created me for…I walk on!   Â
