For most of last year, my wife and I have spent our efforts, time, and energy preparing to embark on living overseas as we support, help, and in God’s hands grow the reach of His greatest initiation to mankind – Christ’s eternal gift of grace! I could spend your precious time unpacking the wild ride of 2021 but we have at the present a greater story to tell. It is a story of God’s faithful help, a story of Healing, a story of complete transformation, a story of a precious and dear person who has been Transformed to His Way.

A Premise of Promise

Before I share any story of how others have been changed by the Truth of Christ, the message of the Bible, the Power of the Holy Spirit and the grace of God there is first this opportunity to change your story. God in all His greatness, eternal power, existence, and knowledge made a definite decision concerning YOU. Yes, God has made up His mind about you and if you have spent any time of your life in a pew listening or reading this Truth from the Bible for yourself you would quickly know that this decision came at great cost to Him. A part of His very being was laid aside for you so that you one day could make a decision to once and for all be part of Him in a powerful and eternal relationship. This GIFT was CHRIST! This one and only way to connect with God is CHRIST. This access to God is by grace recieved through faith in the very truth found within Christ’s message found within the scriptures(The Bible). God has made up His mind about you, I implore you to make up your mind about Him turn from YOUR WAY and be Transformed to His way. God has a place for you, a purpose for you, and most importantly a new life altogether. These stories I have to share are of individuals who have done just that and have continued in that CALLING that God graciously keeps initiating to regenerated hearts and minds.

“For the Gifts and Calling of God are without Repentance.”

Romans 11:29

A Man with a Gift and Calling

The first man I would like to share about has without a doubt a story. He would be that man you meet that you just can never forget. His story began in Czech Republic and in these years God’s initiation of Love started to break through, he was busy practicing the dark arts and a true Satanist. If it was black, lifeless, and hopeless, this man was most likely into it. He stated that on his very person all sorts of belt-like straps saturated with occultic insignia and symbolism wrapped around him. He was constantly paranoid in this time of life and with that carried with him many knives. If you were to see him walk into your store you would most likely keep tabs on him and keep your distance, yet God did no such thing. In this time of life, he had some relatives and even friends who reached out to him and even gifted him a Bible that he decided to study for the purpose of mocking them. This detail is important as he did in this dark period of his life have a light shining. So here he was in the thrall of darkness and the very deception of the devil himself, feeling fearful, hopeless, and empty. No substance could numb the pain that he was now experiencing within and in this pain, the very presence of Christ showed up. He states, ” A man clothed in white appeared at my door”. Startled by this personal Christophany, he immediately went to stab this white-robed man and to his surprise the advances were met by nothing as he could not touch him, harm him, or affect his presence at the door. He said that at this time he quickly recalled he had a Bible and frantically searched its contents knowing that this white-robed man had to be Holy. As he searched haphazardly he kept finding verses pertaining to Christ standing at the door and knocking. The first of this series that he found is written in Revelation 3:20

Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me. 

Revelation 3:20

Still in shock of this experience, he states, “I just knew this white-robed man was Christ and I needed to ask Him into my heart and my life was going to change”. And Change his life did! He knew what he needed but in all his studies to mock the very words he was now hanging onto with his life, he did not know how to ask Christ into his life let alone how to pray so he proceeded to go out in public holding his Bible in front of him wide open in hopes that someone would show him what he needed within. Having no luck in this approach, he then recalled a church that he was once invited to and went straightaway to enter its courts. Spending some time there with the church, He was telling me that the leader of a group he attended, cannot say of what sort, publicly stated, “This man here is least likely to follow God”. I hope that this leader has by now been reproved of such statements because the man of which I am focused on told me that of that group present that day he was of the few that went forward to follow God. And Follow Christ he did! After accepting Christ into His life, he was telling me that he purposed to change his appearance as it represented a life that had no more power over him. He said, ” the sky was always grey in my life and for the first time I looked up and I saw a deep and rich blue”. He also stated, ” As I removed the belts with all the symbols and insignia from my body I realized I was larger than I thought and my clothes were now too small”. His very apparel was holding his body in bondage and with each strap that he removed the man told me that great burdens were lifted from him. He also decided to throw all his many knives into the river and for the first time ever in his life, this man was FREE!

” the sky was always grey in my life and for the first time I looked up and I saw a deep and rich blue”

The man with a gift and calling

Now the issue was that he was broke, ill-dressed, and suffering withdrawal effects from the substances he was once bound to. In a word, he was in dire straights. Fortunately, God’s hand was not shortened in this time either as a rehabilitation center had given him a flyer with requirements of what he would need. By faith he went to acquire what he needed with not a dime to his name, he had but a small stash within his pocket. Desiring to get on track and begin his new life he went to go get the required items for entering the rehab, but was finding himself in great hunger. He bought food with what he thought was the last of his stash and along with him he gave what he had to another man who was in need, but to his surprise, the pocket still had money in it. He then went to the store buying what he needed and finding the means for each item from that feeble stash. As he recalled this time he said, ” I did not dare go to count what was in my pocket because I somehow knew that if I looked it would no longer be a miracle”. Now, having all that was required he went forward to get his life and walk forward with God with what he had left. And walk forward this man has!

Today this man now caravans all throughout the Balkans helping refugees in dire need. He travels with little and his wife faithfully supports and sometimes accompanies him on his journey’s that at times can be months. He lives by that same gospel that supplied him at his beginning with God and to his account MANY have had their lives changed also by the truth that God has made up His mind about us to save us!