The Favor of God

I want to just testify to all the goodness God has shown us in these last weeks. So many things had to happen, and in a hurry, for us to be able to move from El Paso back to Florida.

First, we had to sell our house there. I guess we bought our house when the market was up. So after ten years, our realtor told us to ask less than we had paid for the house. That was depressing! We asked a little bit more instead. But in three weeks, we had only three people come to see the house, and none of them was enthused. It seemed we were just stuck, going nowhere. I told my wife, “We haven’t prayed together about this. Let’s agree together in prayer. We have to see some sort of progress! At this point, nothing at all is happening. We’re going nowhere!” She agreed with me in prayer, and we asked God to bring us someone who would truly appreciate and desire our house.

I tell you no lie – in a matter of just three hours, a family from Mexico City came, and we could tell right away, they really liked our house! Within a short time, they let us know they were interested, and a few days later, they came back to walk through the house with a friend who was an engineer. They were talking about alterations they would make and it seemed clear, they were serious! Soon we had a contract on the house, but they couldn’t close for two months, because it would take that long to get their money from their previous house. That suited us just fine, because we had much to do as well.

Lynn thought we should take a month to go looking for a house and the seminary which I should attend. She usually comes up with sensible ideas, so I agreed. We headed for Charlotte, North Carolina, to investigate Southern Evangelical Seminary. I’d heard about them through Frank Turek, and since they had an apologetics emphasis, I thought it might be the place for me to continue my studies. We drove there, stopping off to visit Bill and Christine Francis in New Braunfels Texas. Bill was the director of YWAM El Paso when we served there, and it was very nice visiting with them after so many years. From there we made it to Montgomery, Alabama, and then to Charlotte the next day.

We had appointments to meet with the president of the seminary, Dr. Richard Land, and another professor, as well as some people from the admin department. We found our way to the seminary, which turned out to be rather small, as it was only established fairly recently. I dressed for our interview, and we drove there, spending time at a local park as the time clicked by. We were praying for God’s guidance the whole time. When we met with Dr. Land, he expounded about the seminary, and all its positive aspects. But in the midst of his dialogue, completely unsolicited, he spoke about their position on eschatology, the doctrine of the last days. His position was completely contrary to what I believe. He said all who came there held to this doctrine, but I don’t hold to it! What to do? I decided to be honest and tell him I didn’t agree. He told me I would still be welcomed, but would probably end up frustrated, since what I believe is so different. Then we met with a professor from the seminary, and various admin people. All were very kind and helpful.

That night, I couldn’t sleep well, which is rather normal for me. Around three in the morning, I began to think about my doctrine of the last days. Where had I learned it? Well, my undergraduate work was at Southeastern University (an Assemblies of God institution), but our Theology Four textbook was from Regent University. It was called Renewal Theology, and was written by a Dr. J. Rodman Williams. That was where I got my doctrine of the last days. Hmmm, I thought, where is Regent? Virginia Beach, Virginia. Wonder how far away that is? Turned out to be about five hours north of us. Well, Lynn and I thought, let’s go to Virginia Beach!

The next day we drove up there, and checked into a hotel. While swimming in the pool, I witnessed to a Muslim man and his wife who were from Kuwait. I always love such opportunities. The next day, we drove to Regent, and were immediately impressed by the beautiful campus. All the buildings were colonial-style brick, with beautiful white columns. There was a big fountain made out of stone from Jerusalem, and many other beautiful features. We were taken on a tour of the campus, and introduced to a professor who explained lots of things to me and challenged me to go for my degree, no matter my age. I was impressed, but not as pleased with their curriculum and still not sure this was the place for me. Nevertheless, I filled out an application while there.

The next day, we headed south toward Florida. I had attended Columbia International University in Columbia, South Carolina some years back, for a summer Russian program, so we decided to visit them as well. We spent the night two hours north of there, then arrived at the university the next morning. We toured that campus and had lunch in the cafeteria, then met with an advisor. He too was very helpful and their curriculum seemed very suitable and acceptable to me. Not only that, but they were willing to grant me credit for some of my other studies and my work as a pastor. When we left there, I was pretty sure I would complete my master’s through Columbia. We drove down to Florida with that in mind.

After spending some time at the Atlantic coast, in a place called Ormond Beach, we went to Orlando, to visit my brother and sister, then traveled an hour and fifteen minutes south to see our daughters and sons-in-law. On my laptop, I looked into the backgrounds of the professors at both Columbia and Regent. I saw that those at Columbia were of a totally different theological persuasion than those of Regent. I made some calls to Regent to clarify some of the things I hadn’t been pleased with regarding their curriculum. As a result of those talks, I concluded that indeed, I could be satisfied with the Regent curriculum, but needed to change my degree from the master of divinity to a master of theological studies. It requires less hours and seems more focused on things I want to pursue. I made my decision, and was accepted at Regent! I was even told I was eligible for some scholarship money because of graduating summa cum laude from Southeastern. Every little bit helps!

After a day or two in Lakeland, we headed to Homosassa, Florida, were Lynn had booked us a vacation rental by owner place on a canal which led to the Homosassa River and from there to the Gulf of Mexico. People who go to that place are mostly tourist fishermen and such (we did manage to do some canoeing in the area however.) But we went there for the purpose of using it as a base from which to look for a new home. We got a realtor by connecting to Christian financial expert Dave Ramsey’s website. We told her our price range, and she began taking us around to see various houses. Well, none of them was anything like what we wanted! After almost a week, it seemed we would have to give up. We’d have to bring all our belongings from Texas and unload them into storage somewhere, only to later load them all up again to move to a house. It was a terrible prospect! Then Lynn found a house that looked interesting on Zillow.com. We drove there and it seemed right for us. In no time, we’d made an offer, and though there was a previous offer ahead of ours, it was ours that the seller agreed to. In such a short time, we’d come to a completely unknown area and found a suitable house to live in. Slowly, but surely, each piece of the puzzle was falling into place, each need we had was being met by God’s provision.

From Florida, we left our car with one of our daughters and flew to California for perhaps our last visit with family there. We had a great time over a few days, and were able to have lots of really deep conversations in which we argued and presented the Christian position. I really love my California family, and I really enjoyed swimming in the Pacific Ocean on one of our days there!

We flew back to El Paso, after having been gone a whole month. Now came the challenge of getting a rental truck, finishing our packing, and finding people to help us load up and get out of Dodge. We give thanks to God for the wonderful way He so graciously helped us through a lot of great people. The Canos lent us their pickup truck, and we used it to get around and to haul stuff for the several days we were there. The Chavezes fed us three different meals and let us spend the night with them. They also opened their home for us to have one final meeting with all of you who could come. That was a great time for us, to see you one last time, share what’s been happening, and many of you generously gave us gifts to help us on our way.

We didn’t really have a team “signed up” to help us do everything that had to be done. Several had promised help, but things kept going wrong, and most of them had to back out for various reasons. We were wondering how in the world we would get things done. It turned out that many people we’d thought would help couldn’t, but God sent us different people. Robert Wilson and Roberto Dominguez came on Thursday and helped us get set up for loading the truck. I went and picked it and a trailer for my motorcycle up, but then I had to spend hours returning to each U-Haul place to get insurance. I hadn’t thought that necessary at first. Roberto mowed our lawn and the two young men also took beds and heavy furniture apart.

The next day was D-Day. We were supposed to load everything we own onto our truck, then clean the house, and do it all in time to shower, change, and go to the closing at Stewart Title by 4:30 pm. It seemed impossible. So few men had volunteered or could give us their time. Was I going to have to load everything myself? I was sure we would never finish in time. We’d probably have to interrupt our work to shower and do the closing, then come back and work till midnight at least.

But God sent us just enough people and just the right ones at the right time. Hiram Samaniego came and worked all day long, carefully fitting everything together in the truck like a Tetris puzzle. The two Roberts sweated and slaved away for another full day. Troy Roberts couldn’t come himself, but he loaned us three of his sons, and those young guys really were a Godsend, working till almost dark! Jessie and Jillian O’Neil came, as did Rose Lewis and Jill Giallanza, then Lulu Kachmar, and they helped Lynn to pack and mark boxes and get things ready to load all day long. They also swept and mopped and vacuumed, so the house was ready for the new buyers. Richard Sheraga even came to help me tie down my motorcycle so I wouldn’t have to worry about that.

At around 4, although I never would have believed it, everything was ready! Hiram told me to go take a shower. Everything was covered. He even took the watch off his own wrist and put it on mine, because he’d heard me say mine had gone kaput. I was so blessed. We hurried to the closing where our friends and former church members, Brent and Janis Clarke were there to not only show us where to sign, but to also pray over us and bless us. What a closing! (By the way, many prayed over us during this process; Bill and Christine, Troy Roberts and family, the Clarkes, and I’m sure others I haven’t mentioned.) All those prayers so blessed us, and I’m sure that intercession is what made everything come together as it did.

That evening after the closing, we returned to our house, where Troy and his boys were still working on some final things. I had a bucket of oil that needed to be taken to Auto Zone. I had some galvanized metal I needed to get out of the back yard. There was a porch swing we no longer wanted, but had to get rid of. The Roberts clan took care of all those last minute worries so we didn’t have to. The buyers wanted to walk through the house with us. They came and we did that, and they asked that we pray over them and the house. As we did, the wife cried. She said she felt such peace moving into that house, and thanked us profusely for praying. The husband told me they’d both read my booklet called Triumph and Tragedy, about a Lebanese/Mexican evangelist who was like St. Francis of Assisi. They’d also gone to my website and wanted to hear more. I pray they will grow in their relationship with the living God.

We spent the night with the Chavez family again, and they graciously fed us and blessed us in so many ways. The next day, Lynn drove the Cano’s pickup, which was filled with last minute junk from our garage and shed, and I drove the U-Haul down to the Jesus Chapel parking lot. From there we went to the Cano’s house, and Hector then drove his pickup to the dump, so he and I could get rid of all that was in the back. We had prayer with Hector and Teresa, then we loaded ourselves into the U-Haul and headed for our new lives. Carolina Kaemingk, daughter of missionaries in Creel, Chihuahua, (she’d lived with us for about the last year), took Lynn around in her car for last minute banking and other errands before saying good-bye.)

I drove that truck over 1700 miles, falling asleep often, struggling through heavy rains, and even experiencing a fender-bender with a semi in San Antonio that could’ve wiped us out. God helped us all the way. When we came into Florida, there was a tropical depression which was dumping incredible amounts of precipitation on a state already saturated with water. But we made it through. Now what? How would we get this thing unloaded here, without any friends or contacts?

Lynn had noticed a sign in a thrift store advertising help in moving furniture. We’d called them and a couple came out to speak with us about our need. It turned out they could help us unload, but the man was also a handyman. So I made a deal with him to help me paint our new house (it was painted with an assortment of brilliant colors we just couldn’t agree with.) He and I and his wife or partner got to work, and were able to paint the entire house in a day and a half. I was exhausted, but very pleased with the results. Then were was one more big challenge – the truck.

The next day, he came with the woman’s two sons, young men in their twenties. Together, soaked with sweat, we unloaded that truck in a little over half a day. It was exhausting for sure, and when it was done, I said, “It is finished!” The neat thing was, I was able to witness to the young guys and the father at different times throughout the whole experience. We wonder if they might be part of the reason we’ve come here. I just have a stronger than normal feeling there are people in this area I am sent to find and lead to Christ, and this family is probably the first of those.

After the heavy work was done, our daughter and a son-in-law came to help us with smaller details just yesterday. We finally have at least the main areas of our house, bedroom, kitchen, my office, set up so we can live here. Both Lynn and I feel amazed that we have been “transplanted” to a completely different world in such a seemingly short period of time. It all came together amazingly, and we are so thankful to God and to everyone He used to help us. We are so blessed and so touched by all of you for your generosity and your amazing and even Herculean efforts. We know you really sacrificed to do it, and we so appreciate it, more than words can say. May God bless you all so abundantly!

One final note: During the first day of painting, I had to shower and change, then drive about 45 minutes from here, through beautiful, green fields and woods, to an interview at a state correctional facility for a chief chaplaincy position. The warden, former chaplain, and a female supervisor grilled me for maybe thirty minutes or so. I haven’t received a call back, so maybe they didn’t pick me, but it was a good experience for me anyway. That was the first interview I’ve gone through since 2005! I need the practice! So right now, the greatest need is employment for Lynn and me both. I’ve also been through some preliminary phone interviews to get set up for the master’s degree program. I’ll be ordering books and getting started within this next week!