My Story
and How
love4love was born
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EARLY LIFE
My early life was full of love from my family but it fell short of making me feel I was accepted for who I was. It was not their fault. I did not know at the time no person is suppose to fulfill our deepest love and acceptance of who we are. So, I am thankful I did not find it in others and God knew this before I was born. I often wonder if God gives everyone a heart to search until we find Him. The love I was searching for always seamed out of my reach, like this little girl in the photo above. I was confused most of my life about who I was, my plan, and my purpose for living. Through my natural human sinful nature I was living out I became worst of the worst in the sins I had committed. I felt like a little puzzle piece that did not quite fit in the great puzzle of life. I searched and searched for what ever would quench my thirst of acceptance, in this dried up desert I was living in. The desert I was living in was full of one oasis after another that was nothing but mirages when I got up close.
I did not accomplish much in my early life as far as worldly accomplishments go. I was not a great student nor did I accomplish great works to be talked or read about. Most people who are successful today come from a early childhood of success but that was not the case for me. In my year book under my name you will not read most successful, most kind, hardest worker, or most comical. It is blank. I tried religion but no one was living like those in the early church that followed Christ. Most of the religions I saw or tried was man-made traditions that claimed came from a god they or other people imagined like the mirages I was seeing. The Christians I knew did not have His Word as a witness to all their traditions, ways, and teachings I heard and was taught. This caused me not to truly beleive in the Christian God most people believed in because most people were not living as He taught and HIs Word proclaimed His early church lived. There were too many additions and subtractions so I thought it was like every other religion. It looked like He was the Potter everyone was molding and shaping to fit their own views of the God they wanted to beleive in.โ
I went my own way, which, was no way at all. I ended up still living in a dried up dessert. I was still reaching for love and acceptance I never thought I would ever find. I thought He was a myth that people imagined in their mind. I thought they used it as a way to live with hope. Most people I knew were working their own way into Heaven, but I never saw His Spirit of truth giving them their faith and His work in them and through them He ask them to pour out. I never saw His miracles, signs and wonders most of my life. They were hidden underneath the man-made images and lives person were living.
AN IDEA IS BORN LIKE A FLOWING RIVER
or A STRIKE OF LIGHTNING THAT NEVER BURNS OUT.
AN IDEA IS BORN LIKE A FLOWING RIVER
or A STRIKE OF LIGHTNING THAT NEVER BURNS OUT.
Love for love has been like a fresh spring that bubbled up from His Holy Spirit from one thought to another, and it turned into a river that has never stopped moving or like a strike of lightning that never burns out. After my Lord was pleased to reveal Himself in me because it took me a long time to become empty of anything in the world I could find, including myself, to receive the grace I needed. It was 40 odd years of searching before I heard His truth due to my emptiness of following others and myself. January of 2007 the idea of Love4love was born through an elderly lady that told me she needed help with cleaning her home, and then it turned into a loving relationship that gave her rides to the doctor, grocery store, and out to lunch! Then came another that needed our Lord's help with addiction, hoarding, marital, and financial needs. I was following Him every step of the way through His Spirit and Word of truth and He gave me a huge craving of His Word that took me beyond my own understanding. The meaning of love4love was proven through me and them and His Word testified in Matthew 10:7 for us all. As you go, preach this message: The kingdom of heaven is near.' Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.
I heard my Lord loud and clear,
Freely you have received my Love and freely you will give it as you received it!
Love4Love was born. The number 4 represents the Father, Son, Holy Spirit and me all wrapped up in my body! Do not ask me how He does it, that is far above my knowledge and understanding! All I know is they are there always with me, guiding me and pouring into me daily without ever stopping like a river that always flows from the mountains into the valleys.
ANOTHER IDEA IS BORN, AND ANOTHER, AND ANOTHER, FOR
HIS GLORY , TO GLORY, TO GLORY UNTIL HE CALLS ME HOME
ANOTHER IDEA IS BORN, AND ANOTHER, AND ANOTHER, FOR
HIS GLORY , TO GLORY, TO GLORY UNTIL HE CALLS ME HOME
Through all the life changing relationships I met through my service ministry another idea was born in 2011. God gave me a huge desire to write all I was learning down through His Word and using my own life experiences as a witness of who I was learning from, not me, or others, but Him and Him alone and through others confirming what He was teaching me. He then ask me to share with the public an article He gave me to write.
I argued with him in tears for days thinking I was not qualified to do what His Holy Spirit was leading me to do. What He wanted me to take to my small town News Paper, The Newan Times Herald, had no submissions guide lines, it had numerous misspelled words, wrong grammar usage, and it was hand written on a spiral piece of note book paper due to my lack of typing skills! I thought to myself, I will show Him He has lost His mind wanting me to share my writing with the public! As if I could show God anything! I set outside in the parking lot for 30 minutes contemplating whether to go in or not. My Heavenly Father and me made an agreement in prayer before I left the car. I told him when this article is thrown into the trash he had to leave me alone and never ask me to share what I wrote with the public in any way. He did not answer, but He brought a question to my mind, "What if it is published what will you do then?" He often ask without answering. I told Him I would write for Him as often as He gave me something to write about; not thinking it would ever be published. Kind-a like telling your Mother and Dad you will clean your room up everyday if they take you to Disney World but never really thinking we will go to Disney World. I could never see myself writing a grocery list every time I went to the grocery store, much less books, articles, devotionals, Bible studies, and poems. Many people use to tell me if you can't see yourself doing it, don't do it. Well, this was the perfect time I did not see myself doing anything God was giving me to do. At the same time I knew if I did not take this raggedy piece of spiral note book paper in the News Paper's office my mind would never be empty of it. With eyes red and swollen from crying I marched right in the News Paper's office, laid it on the counter, and said to the receptionist, "God wanted me to give this to you." I never looked her in the eye, turned quickly around, and walked out as quickly as I walked in. When I was outside I took a deep breath and said out loud, "Thank God that's over!"
A few weeks later I got a phone call from the Newnan times Herald saying my article was going to be published in the editors column Saturday before Easter. At first I thought someone was playing a joke on me, and then I remembered I never told anyone what I did. I said, "Thank you," and hung up the phone and I let it go. I did not want to go down that road again. Then came Saturday before Easter and those nagging thoughts found a crack in my mind and weaved their way back in. I went to the coinvent store and bought a paper thinking I was going to end this nagging and troublesome thought one way or another. I did not even know what an Editor's column was. That is how clueless I was about professional journalism, reading, and writing. I was 49 years old and knew nothing about writing, submissions, journalism, literature, spelling, or grammar. I thumbed through the paper two times before I saw the words "Editors Column" in big bold black letters. I saw an article, but it had a title and mine did not have a title. It read "God's Wish For Us All." Well, I thought to myself, this person must know something I do not know. What does God wish for us all? Then I read the first few words and they were my words! How could this be I thought. Tears were welling up in my eyes. I quickly looked at the bottom of the article and there in black print was my name! I could not beleive it! I began crying so hard I began whaling and had to cover my mouth with my hands so the other people in the parking lot of the convenient store would not rush to my rescue. The editor gave it the title! He or she fixed it and polished it up to be the article it was meant to be! What an amazing God we have! He truly does equip us for all He gives us to do, even when we think He is crazy, and we think we can't do them. HE NEVER STOPS GIVING! Since that day in 2010 I have wrote all He has poured into me and I am still waiting to see what He does with all and will do with the rest He gives me in what He has taught me for others. He has done many miracles already through what I have written and I know there is more still ahead. My teaching classes and speaking engagements came after, like the wind blows the river forever forward, and the lighting never burns out. His words He gives me to speak and teach are not any different than the ones He gives me to live through and write!๐๐งก๐