Last night Kathy and I participated in a group of 10 Celebrate Recovery leaders working through a video series topically addressing God giving man a second chance.  This is being led by one of our pastors.  The second video tackled Guilt/Shame.  I knew shame has always been a huge part of what kept me in bondage (and still does to this day at times).  It is difficult to tell my story fearing someone will come along and validate the old beliefs I’ve had of myself.  There was a magnificent quote that was in the materials saying the greatest bondage of shame lies in me being unable to forgive myself.  I am fully aware of this need.  Yet, it keeps popping back up anytime I’m facing directly the torment of my past.

Last night God was showing me again the tentacles still clenching some of my soul.  I am so much freer than I’ve ever been but God isn’t done healing until I can say all these tentacles are gone.  I’ll know this when the memories of past don’t want to shut me down.  I say in my testimony as given last weekend that God has laid a passion within me to tell others caught in this bondage of shame.  Well, I still know the bondage but instead of it crippling me into silence, it only holds me back somewhat.  I’m becoming more and more aware that I’ve still have some denial to face.  I do get lost in the work I do and it does mask the pain of shame.  But, I released it to God this morning and I’ll continue to do so until the last tentacle is cast out.

Our God is truly a God of Love.  This is what folks need to know more than anything else.  No matter what has been part of their life or what is presently part, God is waiting to hold you, redeem you through His Son Jesus and to fill you with His Mighty Holy Spirit.  It is a life of freedom one never knew could be lived when shame has owned your identity.  I’m so grateful to have found and to be finding these TRUTHS!

Fall definitely hit quickly this year.  We have rarely had a year when summer ended so abruptly.  I’m rather glad however.  The heat of summer wears on me just as the cold of winter does.  That must be another reason why I love Spring so much.

Yesterday as I had blogged about letting God be God and in return I’d do what God was wanting me to do.  I needed to call my co-leader for Celebrate Recovery who takes on the assignment of lessons and testimonies.  She asked me to teach next week’s lesson for our group.  Well, the lesson is #1 since we are starting the new year.  Of course, it is all about admitting “I’m not God”.  I told her I already have my most current example in place to share.  (I think God was smiling at the time).  As I got further into the day I was doing some “helpful work” for one of my kids.  While doing so I found a number of things not being cared for as I thought they should be.  I jumped right into thinking of all the reasons they weren’t being properly cared for and when I talked to my daughter to “scold her” I found out the actual reasons.  Well, God reminded me all over again that He is God in all things–even with my close family.  If I am going to do some helpful work, it is not my place to take charge of all the other details.

Today I go to our State Dept. of Education for a day with them preparing for the work of this coming year.  In so doing, I once again am going to start Spirit led.  I truly do not like letting myself show up as I did yesterday and the day before.  I want to be a man who models living the life of Christ, not man.

Tonight and tomorrow our pastor overseeing the work of Celebrate Recovery is taking the core leaders through a book study on the topic of God giving man a second chance.  I am really looking forward to this.  God is so good in doing this.  I’m so glad too that He doesn’t keep track of how many second chances it takes.  To God be all Glory!

Last night was our kick-off for Celebrate Recovery’s new year.  We have finished 9 and beginning the 10th.  It was a wonderful evening of honesty.  Eight people talked about each of the 8 Principles and told why it was meaningful to them and their own personal recovery.  One of the things I loved about it was my own wife stood before the group and gave her 4 minute testimony.  She has never stood before our group to do this in our first 9 years.

I have spent the past two days in training for stepping back into the educational consulting work I do.  In it I learned the adjustments in federal and state requirements meeting educational laws of the land.  These always adjust somewhat with each new administration.  I found myself getting more and more disturbed as the day went on (yesterday).  Some of these changes are only due to the administration change.  They won’t change anything relevant to kids learning and what teacher’s need to do to instruct well.  All of a sudden I was wondering why I was back here?

This morning as I had stepped into the journaling part of my devotional time I was writing out my frustrations to God.  I was telling Him how I had gone into education 45 years ago and wanted my years to be worthwhile for Him and for educational work.  However, all these years later, I find the system repeating the cycles it had been doing 45 years ago.  Yes, we know more about what to do with kids and their learning but getting a system that better ensures this is done well for all kids is about where it was many years back.  So, when I was done writing this out God reminded me of Principle One from last night:  “Know I’m not God….”  God was reminding me I wasn’t in education to change it from the top down.  I was in it to make a difference for each one I was directly in contact with.  Even though my thinking might be somewhat good, I am not God.  I am man/flesh.  My thinking goes right up against that of other men.  If God is not at the helm the thinking stops with man.  God was asking me to take His Spirit into the work I do.  If man sees His Spirit in me, His seeds are planted.  I can only do this if I allow God’s Spirit to dominate my steps each day.  Well, this is exactly what I have wanted to do all along.  Let God be God and let me be a good representative of God’s Spirit at work.

OK, I’m better set now.  To God be all Glory!

As I was beginning to start my blog this am I found our computer telling me it had to reboot in order to operate. Not sure what that meant but I took it as a satanic attack because he doesn’t want today’s message published.

As I attended my 7-Pillars class last night an unexpected message came screaming at me.  In reality it didn’t say a word–the old voice of my dad said it all.  As part of an assignment months ago I was to post a picture of someone in our home that when seeing it would remind me to never step back into my old habits.  One would think a picture of Kathy, my kids and grandkids would do this.  However, at the time I was given the assignment I never stepped into doing it because no picture served this purpose.  In last night’s class the reminder of using this tool was talked about.  The truth behind my never doing it had to be spoken.  The reason I never placed a picture up was that it only served as a reminder to me that I was not worthy of them–the one or ones in the picture.  As I had to confess this, one of the men said, “Earnie, maybe you need to put your own picture up to remind you that you are the valuable one.”  With that I just broke down.  All I could hear at the moment was dad’s voice screaming once again what an arrogant guy I am.

This morning I had to find God in this lie, but a “truth” deep within me.  As I opened my journal the scripture at the top of the page read, “Because he loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him.  I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.  He will call on me and I will answer him.” Psalm 91:14-15.  It was then that I asked God to take this lie buried in me and replace it with His Truth.  God showed me that because I love Him, He will rescue me.  He will protect me because I acknowledge His Name.  In truth that is what I’ve wanted to do all my life so I could be valuable to God my Father.  Here, He is telling me this not because of my actions, but because of my belief.

I don’t know if I’ve ever shared this with anyone, but the reason I wanted the picture of me as a little boy in the corner of the front cover of my book was to show readers that this little guy was important.  Now, I am needing to recognize and know for certain God loves me and wants me to love me too.

There is no arrogance in this.  In reality what is in it is a deep commitment to love, cherish and honor.  It is all the things I want to do for others and God is wanting me to see that I can do it for me too.  It seems a strange reality, but one I’ve sure needed to get anchored in.

Isn’t God amazing?!  How much I love Him and thank Him for His gentle, yet firm commitment to restoring great life within.

Coming off of such a powerful weekend, I spent yesterday getting some things done in prep for this week’s work.  Today I start up the consulting work I’ve been doing.  However, in doing so I feel/sense the past habit of steeling myself to needs around me so I can focus only on “the work”.  I also sense a subtle attack creeping in or attempting to.  In the leadership training of last Saturday there was an exercise we did displaying how Satan can deviously enter into God’s Kingdom Work with us and we don’t even know it at the time.

So, let me go into yesterday a bit more.  As the day continued I was feeling some temptations.  The work I was wanting to do outside was being halted due to rain. What would it matter then and who would know if I took only a minute and looked?  Also, my wife and I were struggling over an activity  we are committed to this coming weekend supporting our Celebrate Recovery but interfering with family/kids and grandkids.  I felt like we were compromising what God wanted us to do–testing our faith in Him not knowing the outcome of His planned work, but easily seeing what our kids wanted us to do for them.  This morning I was seeing how Satan is wanting to use both of these relationship issues to halt what God is intending.  It is easy to say no to an unknown when we can see the direct outcome of something else.  So, this morning I sensed God showing me how Satan is wanting to use my closest relationships to deter me (us) from His Kingdom Work.

I know that our family isn’t at risk with staying focused on God’s Work.  God has a way of bringing about His miracles when we obey His nudges in our lives.  I do want to be very awake to His nudges as I continue my journey with Him.

The weekend has come and gone.  A new week is before me.  As I was reflecting this morning with God about the next steps, applying what I am to do with all I learned from the weekend, I read Jeremiah11-16.  In these chapters God is having Jeremiah tested to see if he is ready to complete the assignments given to him.  There are some important, critical items God wants brought before the Israelites.  Jeremiah has some tough assignments ahead of him so God ran him through testing.  I can sense my own testing now that I’m home. I sense God asking me if I am willing to do any next steps on His terms?  All through my life I’ve been one to get new info and very quickly put it into action once I’m home.  Any teacher who ever taught for me will tell you they cringed when I went to conferences knowing I’d be coming home with all this new learning for us and new applications to try.

This topic of sexual brokenness–how well I know it–cannot be addressed as though it is a passing topic.  There is a toughness needed to tackle the topic, but there is also a tenderness and sensitivity needed too.  God knows when His children are ready including when He has His leaders ready.  I told Him this morning I want to be in His timeline.  It is then that God’s Kingdom Work is accomplished.  I do know God has been working on me with my own story preparing me to use it for Him.

As I told my story to the congregation of my friend yesterday one lady told me afterwards that she could see how God has been helping me step out of myself and stepping into His Purpose.  I hadn’t thought about this from that angle, but after hearing her say this I can see the progression of God’s healing and His focus on using the healing as a motivation to help others do the same.  God is so Good.  Helping others find healing is a tough but wonderful assignment.  I praise God He would even consider me for this.  To God be All Glory.

Today will end the trip to Western Oregon.  Before Kathy and I head home we will head to Gresham where a friend I graduated from high school with is the preacher at a community church.  When he and I had talked over a year ago and he had heard of me writing my autobiography, he asked if I’d share my story with his congregation when we ever came to his region of the country.  Well, today is that day.  I don’t often go before a Sunday morning group.  Most of them only come for a good sermon, get their kids to Sunday School, spend sometime in worship and go back home to relax before their new week begins.  Of course I am stereotyping somewhat as I write this, but that is what my mind/fears say.  They don’t come to church to hear a story of someone’s troubled past.  I do know from sharing my story in various settings that there is much more sexual brokenness that man wants to admit.  It is an area Satan tries his best to keep in secret.  He can continue to do his damage if we keep it hidden in shame.  I pray much shame is destroyed this morning as I enter into this opportunity.

Yesterday’s training I attended with the Mid-Valley Fellowship group was phenomenal.  I was continuously impressed and learned a great deal.  I’d love to have my hands on the curriculum so I could be taking it home and starting it tomorrow.  However, I know there is internal work that needs to be done once I get home so patience is a key ingredient for the time being.  When the director and my brother-in-law come for our church’s conference in a few weeks I will then know how much interest there is in our community for starting this ministry of sexual brokenness.  We have a small amount already started so getting it more in full swing will hopefully be the right next step.  The one thing I want more than anything is to do this in God’s will and timing.  I’ve spent enough of my years trying to do things on my own.  Prayers for this will be appreciated as we take steps in days and weeks ahead.

God is such a wonderful God.  How intimately He loves us.  How much I am learning regarding this about Him.  How can this immense God of our universe desire time with this tiny speck in His Kingdom?  Yet, He does and for this I am so grateful.  To God be all Glory!

Today is my second grandson’s 14th birthday.  He is a tremendously good kid.  He is entering into the vulnerable teen years.  How I pray God’s protective Hands to be upholding him as he lives life in our tumultuous days.

Today I experience day two of the reason I’m here in Albany, OR.  I get to experience the day of training Mid-Valley Fellowship takes their volunteer leadership through.  It is one of the first times I’ve ever walked into a “vulnerable time” not feeling anxious.  I truly walk into this day with eager anticipation.  Meeting with the director yesterday and a couple of the other paid employees of the ministry was also a tremendously good time.  God has opened the door for them and it is apparent they are completing what God has called them to do.

Last night I attended Dwight’s Celebrate Recovery group.  (Dwight is my brother-in-law).  I taught lesson 16–Amends–for the group.  It was a good experience meeting with the people attending and seeing once again that God’s ministry is not isolated to one area or another.  God’s Kingdom Work is taking place all around us once we open our eyes to it and allow ourselves to be available.  I truly want to be on track with God to do His Kingdom Work from this day forward.  I do have “Earnie ideas” of what this may look like as Kathy and I return home Sunday afternoon, but I also know I will need to be very sensitive to only stepping where God is nudging.  I don’t any longer want to be attempting to pry doors open that I see with human eyes rather than with God’s Spiritual Eyes.  We sang “Good, Good Father” last night in the worship time.  It talks of how much we are loved by our Heavenly Father.  I’m finding that in obedience to God, I not only get to experience this Godly love, but I also get to witness God’s love for others as they find Him in the midst of their own Hurts, Hang-ups and Habits.  God is truly our Amazing Father.

Today I write this from Albany, OR.  I am at my brother-in-law’s home.  At noon time I will be meeting the director of Mid-Valley Fellowship.  My brother in law, the director and I will spend much of the afternoon together so I can become familiar with the programs they use and much more.  This all sounds important I suppose, but deep inside me there is something far more important that has taken place just this am.  Let me explain.

Prior to making this trip I’ve blogged each day about the angst, worry, anxiety, stress of making this trip.  I knew beyond a shadow of doubt God wanted me doing it.  However, I had a multitude of fears bombarding my mind and soul.  I was putting myself into the very presence of all my years of abuse all over again.  Why would God want me here I kept asking?

I mentioned a book I’ve finished reading, Homosexuality and the Christian, I wanted to read it so I could better understand how these two topics could be placed into one person–if that were ever possible.  Little had I understood that this has always been a tremendous haunt of mine.  Just the thought of a gay topic made me just like my brother–an abuser.  Well, today I know beyond a shadow of doubt the lie in this message or thought.  Satan has had a hay day my entire life keeping me in tremendous bondage over it.

As I was reading the start of the Old Testament book, Jeremiah, this morning, I read that Jeremiah, when young, doubted his ability to be a prophet of God.  People wouldn’t listen to him, etc. he thought.  God assured him that he was to obey Him, not his fears of man.  God says He chose Jeremiah while he was in his mother’s womb.   God made a comparison to obeying Him in His bringing the children of Israel out of Egypt where they had plenty of water from the Nile to a parched land called Israel.  What the people couldn’t see in their Promised Land was the wealth of water under the parched land–Springs of Living Water.  It was at this moment this morning that God showed me He had placed those same springs of living water within me long ago.  This Spring of Living Water is His Very Holy Spirit.  I had always seen myself as this parched, barren land.  No matter what I’d done, I never could picture myself as being productive.  I was only temporarily lucky.  The next time I probably wouldn’t be lucky.  Today, the idea I needed to hope I was good is replaced with assurance that His Gift within me was what was good.  I–the vessel of this beautiful Gift–as chosen by God and even created by Him is now with a purpose and I can be good.  So much of this I’ve known in my thinking mind for years.  Today, I know it in my heart and feel real assurance it is now true.   How I love this patient Father of mine!

I feel as though today is a milestone day.  Before I step into the driver’s seat of our car heading to Western Oregon, I need to reflect a moment.  In my first 20 years of living I learned to loathe a few things to the point that I had to keep them firmly hidden.  One of those was the homosexual use of me, the other was the feelings I had about myself fed from my father’s disappointment in what I wasn’t.  During the next 20 years I did keep this all hidden with the exception of telling Kathy when we married and one other friend.

In the next almost 20 years (17 to be exact) I opened up about my past only in a very controlled setting with a few people who might benefit from knowing I had a past so they could address getting help with their own.  In the past 10 years, finally opening up fully to the hurt of my past, God is taking me to a place where my past will become the topic of my future.  I have no idea if it will be my only topic, but I do know He wants me free to do this and I really am free.  Satan did his best to deter this from happening but God’s faithfulness prevails.  My prayer warrior sent me some scriptures yesterday to bolster me.  She said, “We talk about Satan’s strongholds and addictions but I love Psalms 27:1 that says the Lord is our stronghold!  He is much more MIGHTY that the devil or any of Satan’s strongholds.”

Today I sense the Lord’s Stronghold on me.  As I was having my devotions I could sense the storm around me but I was sitting in the eye of it.  I suddenly awoke to the reality that the eye of the spiritual storms we face is God’s Holy Spirit.  Nothing can penetrate the love and grace of this place.  Hallelujah.  As I now go into the next few days to be introduced to a program helping those struggling with homosexuality and other sexual addictions, I know I’m facing one of Satan’s strongest grips on mankind.  However, I now know why in Ephesians 6 Paul says when we are equipped with the armor of God, we can stand in the spiritual attacks.  It is not our strength that allows this, it is the very presence of God’s Holy Spirit surrounding us.  I know this today like I never have before.

My mind wants to take this weekend and jump ahead to planning all that will be done resulting from it.  However, this time I’m surrendering that thought to God.  I only want to do what He opens doors to do.  What I do know from His Presence today is that He is pleased I have joined Him in this battle of men.  I will hopefully be able to daily keep you abreast of the developments.  To God be ALL GLORY!