The other day, my friend Lynn Hiles was here to speak in our church. Our conversation turned to West Virginia and the upcoming conference. He and I had a short conversation about something that happened while I was in West Virgina last September. While I was down there the Lord spoke something very powerful to my heart.
It was not a word that was spoken or part of a message. Here is what I heard and saw.
I was watching a road. On this road was a car. While they were driving, they were starting to slowly swerve side to side. There was guardrails like any country road. As I watched it started to hit the guardrails. First slowly and then a little faster. After being tossed about, finally the car came to a stop. There were dents and scratches all around the car as the result of the actions of the vehicle. I looked at the vehicle and that was when I heard the sound of the Lord’s voice.Continue reading Grace Keeps You Off The Guardrails→
Over the last few months I have watched an trend. It is one of two that I have noticed. Both are “negative” trends capitulated by the enemy. The first one I want to address is the “disconnect”.
Disconnecting or the disconnect in its simplest form, means that something is no longer connected. It means to stop or end the supply of something. (We often talk about electricity being disconnected.) So in March I began to see people being disconnected. I thought, “Time to pray” and that is what I did. Continue reading From Disconnect To Reconnect – Community Is In The Air→
As a child one of my enjoyments was working in a garden. My parents loved to garden and it rubbed off on me. At one point I was working for a handicapped man down the street who taught me how to raise vegetables, strawberries and the like. All summer long he sat in a chair at the edge of the garden and coached me. “Put more manure in the base of that hole!” he would shout across the garden. And during that summer I watched magnificent produce come from that garden. Squash and beans and lettuce and spinach. I was amazed as I recalled the seeds that came out of jars from the past year’s harvest. And the strawberries! I would pick quart upon quart and 25¢ a basket just saying “grow!” so that I would receive more money and more work. It didn’t matter how hot it was. It was just an incredible existence. Each day I would head to his little farm, to feed the chickens, pick up eggs and go pick the first strawberries of the day. Later in the summer I would pick vegetables for hours so that he would sell them. Each fall we would collect the leftovers and he and his wife would gather the seeds for the next year’s plantings. Continue reading Just A Garden Variety Kind Of Person→
“If you guys can go to the other side of Houston, I can have you on your way home”, the dispatcher said. Home…we had not been to Vermont for nearly 6 weeks. As we left the truck stop, with the idea of a load going home, everything seemed to be going right. I climbed into the passenger seat and began to rest.
The other night I had a dream. In the dream friends were comparing me and a friend of mine to one another. The difficulty was that they were making my friend sound “less spiritual” because he did not talk about the prophetic, visions or dreams. I though about it for a while and I realized that they were looking for the “fire” while my friend was trying to impart strength and understanding of the word of God.
The schisms are less than before but we still have division. We speak of Psalm 133 and yet we allow things to divide us. Continue reading Hung Up On God→
I am pulling together some notes that have been sitting on my files for a number of years. The following is one of those. I will add notes as things have changed or come to pass.
April 2007
Last night was one of those great nights, marked by people participating. People getting involved. One of my problems is I always try to squeeze a lot in. Last night was no different. Continue reading Thoughts from 5 Years Ago→
Too often we see ourselves changed by situations and circumstances. It is somewhat like being in a car traveling and a large gust of wind comes up, causing a change, even minor, in direction. Or you are traveling in icy weather and the car slides in a direction you had not expected. Oops! What I thought I was doing has changed. Sometimes dramatically. Sometimes it seems like there is no other way to get back to the place you were. Continue reading Don’t Let Your Dreams Be Stolen→
Last night one of my dreams put me in a place of contention with a friend over the world, economics and the topic of bankruptcy versus redemption. He was telling me that in the process of his loss he had been able to develop a process of redemption rather than bankruptcy allowing him and his wife to move ahead.
“Dad, please let me drive the boat,” I asked. I was 8 years old and my parents had a new boat. A 16 foot aluminum boat with a 50 horsepower motor. “Please,” I begged. And then one day my father said “yes.” As soon as he said it, my mom picked her stuff up off the cement platform that the boathouse rolled out on. She told my father he was “crazy.” (She later told me she went up in the woods to pray.) I jumped into the boat, hardly listening to my father’s instructions. The next beach over was a private beach owned by a motel. The people looked over as I climbed into the driver’s seat. Continue reading On My Own – Seasons Of Greatness→
