Eternity Is Reality

I know that I need to post the rest of my testimony, but I wanted to talk about something far more interesting….Jesus! I just finished a 3 week course entitled The Mystical Life of Communion. It was taught by Stephen Venable. Don’t let the title fool you. It was basically a course about meditating on the Word of God in the place of prayer.

The whole premise behind the course was to call us to a place of fascination with Jesus. As Christians living in the United States, we are experiencing far less of what is available in the grace of God to us. With our busy lives and schedules, we rarely take time to fellowship with the Holy Spirirt. We consider it a good day when we read a chapter in our Bible that day. We fail to realize that the Spirit of God lives on the inside of us. Yes, that One. The One with Genesis 1 on His resume. He lives in us and wants to talk to us. We have all the right language with phrases such as I have a personal relationship with God, or it’s a relationship not a religion, unfortunately their is little substance to it. Of course I am probably the only person that this applies to, so just humor me and keep reading.

Fellowshiping with the Holy Spirit requires carving out a little time to actually think about a passage of scripture, and pray it back to God for a period of time. The key is not to give up after a few weeks. We must make it a lifestyle. Stephen shared the experiences of Theresa of Avila, St Francis, and St Bernard to name a few. Their experiences seem unbelievable.

It really gave me a vision to be more intent on the practice of contemplative prayer. I want to experience so much more of the Lord than I have been. We need to take a look back at the Bible and church history to see what a relationship with God really looks like. There is no need for us as believers to be seduced by other lovers such as entertainment, food, etc… We have God living on the inside of us. The world needs to know Him!

You can take any class that FSM offers online. I think it is only $100 or $150. Go to the IHOP websight and click on schools and go from there. I highly recommend going through a couple of classes. I would be glad to suggest a few.

Holli is having a well deserved coffee with a friend, so I thought I would begin the epic that is my life.

When I think of my life it sometimes seems like a dream, and that it happened to someone else. I was born on August 14, 1972, in Wichita, Kansas. My mother and father were both 19 when I was born. My dad was a Jehovah’s Witness and my mom was a Born Again Christian, who typically attended a Baptist church when she went. My parents both loved rock and roll and were known to enjoy a good party! The lures of both kingdoms had been a battle all of my life, until 1997. I was saved when I was 4 years old. For some that is hard to believe, but there is no doubt that I was born again. My mother led me to the Lord in my bed one night. I am forever grateful for her.

From as early as I could remember my dad had played in rock and roll bands. He would have practices/parties at our house all the time. I remember staying up late having dart gun wars with drunken revelers late at night. Every Saturday morning my brother and I would wake with excitement to see who spent the night/passed out the night before. These fortunate folks got to watch cartoons and eat cereal with a couple of rowdy kids instead of nurse hangovers, but usually they were good sports! By the age of 4 or 5 I started to get rid of the little kiddie records and began to listen to cool music. My first record was the Best of Bread. Toys in the Attic by Aerosmith, and Slayed by Slade were favorites of mine, but really it did not get any better than KISS!!! My brother and I had all their records, lunchboxes, posters, dolls, etc… Our mother has many photos of Gabe and I with our KISS makeup on in all of our glory. The seeds were planted, I wanted to be a rock star.

When I was 8 my mom and dad seperated. They had always fought a lot, but I had no grid for what was going on. I was completely devistated. I remember crying a lot in school, and spending a lot of time in the counselors office. At this time my favorite band was The Beatles. I had gotten Double Fantasy by John Lennon at this time, and thought that he was the coolest guy in the world. At almost the same day that we left my dad, John Lennon was killed. (I visited the place where he was killed in NYC years later, what a weird feeling that was!) I became a very self conscience kid at this time. My only interests were music and sports.

We went to church periodically. I was baptized at the age of 8 at Glenville Bible Baptist Church. I really loved the pastor there. His name was Gary Grey. He was a hell fire and brimstone preacher. He definately instilled a healthy fear of God in me.

In sixth grade my dad’s cousin died in a car wreck. This was his best friend. He had a drinking problem before this, but after Jerry died my dad slipped off the deep end and became a raging alcoholic until 1997. I remeber the first time I saw him really drunk. I thought he was going to die. He owned his own business, so he could drink on the job. He would typically begin drinking at about 10am, come home (sometimes) at about 6pm. He would yell at my mom, brother and I for an hour or so and tell us how worthless we were and then pass out. Typically he had no idea of what he had done the night before. I believe that this is the primary reason for the problems that Gabe and I encountered in life. We were cursed day in and day out and were left with a sense of worthlessness. Later I may get more in depth with analysis and theories as to why we have 2 had different outcomes.

In junior high I was really into sports. I played baseball, basketball, and football. I was really into it. I still loved music, but it really took a back seat to sports until I saw a picture of Vince Neal of Motley Crue in a rock mag, and thought this is the coolest guy in the world. That was the turning point in my life to go to the dark side for a season. (about 12 years)