No Stranger To This Valley

So this morning, I am prepared to leave to take Tori and David to school and Mom to work before I have to go to school and work myself. I get in my car and find out that my car doesn't want to start. For a second, I want to get frustrated but my mind begins to recall the many things that God has brought me through.

We have had car trouble all my life. There was a time that we didnt even have a car and we would take the bus to 51st and Glendale every morning at 530 to take Tori to school, and than again on Sunday morning, Sunday night, and Tuesday nights to go to church. We would get there right at church time and than have to leave an hour later because the last bus was leaving at that time so many times, we would miss the preaching. Thank God that although we still have car trouble, we know have a car that has a/c and that has always had the hand of God protecting and keeping it. When we needed car parts and didnt have the money, he provided through a family in our church that has been more than a blessing to us.

Thinking of the revival that has been hitting the church today and the fact that the last days before our Father comes back is so near, its no surprise that the gates of Hell is giving all that it can. But everytime that another trial hits, another valley stands before us, I can't help but smile and think about how great my God has been through each trial and tribulation. I can't help but think that heaven looks all the more sweeter now than ever before.

I look in the mirror and see a changed man. A man that God brought out of the streets, loosened the chains of sins that tightly gripped my life, and restored salvation just in time.

Being a pastor's kid at one time and seeing the fall of an entire family and church, I will be the first to stand up to testify that a life of compromise and directinf our focus on anything but God even for a moment can result in great loss. But as a man that at one time hated going to church who now goes wheneever he can and loves it, I will also be the first to stand up and say that God's mercy, grace, and love for His children is so great that no attack from Hell can ever overcome my God.

Yea, I am waiting for answers to prayers that have been prayed for years with rivers of tears staining the carpet, pillow and pew but I do know that all things work together for good to them that love God. That even in this valley that I am walking through right now, I can proudly lift my eyes to the hills from whence my comes and proudly say that I am blessed and my God will take care of everything that come my way.

This joy that I have. The world didnt give it and the world can't take it away.


Romans 5:3-5 And not only [so], but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; And patience, experience; and experience, hope: And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us.