When The Battle Rages!

"For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."

...Hindsight is 20 x 20 vision...It is crystal clear to us when we look back on our lives and ask God to give us His supernatural perspective on the things that happened in our lives back then...

...How many times have you said, or have heard it said by someone???

..."If only I would have known then, what I know now...?"

As I think back on that period of Time we have been looking at as a Young and Brand New Adult, Brand New Husband, Brand New Dad, and Brand New Free Person in society as far as the justice system was concerned...
...I cannot properly tell you of how significant of an experience that it is, to be free to come and go as you please... without having to get someone elses permission ,
... lest you lose your freedoms completely because your probation officer throws a penalty flag on your life.

...Fortunately for me, and only by the tender Mercies of God, and His Marvelous Grace!
...I never served any hard Prison Time... even though I was a 3 time convicted felon by the time I turned age 19.

"GOD ONLY KNOWS HOW I ESCAPED A HOLE IN THE GROUND OR A HOLE IN A WALL???"

...The battle was truly raging all around me!
 ... My soul, as well as the souls of an untold number of God's most beloved in creation... was what was at stake...

...That Battle was so intense, and so fierce, prior to  moving to Louisianna, {A TRUE CROSSROADS MOMENT THAT WOULD FOREVER CHANGE OUR LIVES AND DESTINY!} that there is not enough room to contain all the books or pages it would take to describe all those moments and battles that took place!
... So many lives have come out very differently and even history  has been profoundly impacted based on a single decision To Pack up my Family And Move to a different Part of the country...

...I'll tell a few of the stories on just a few, in order that God!
... Not Satan, will get "ALL" the GLORY!

... Everytime I reflect back on those events...The more I realize...
... how awesome, and powerful, God really is!

 "GOD Truly loves us, and desires for us to Choose Him, over Ourselves and the pleasures of this world...!"

Remember  Scott Underwood and his family???

...We hung out quite a bit during that time and often time did things as couples.

 Scott and Tammy, Beth and I went camping, dancing, Parties, movies and a dinner occasionally,

But Scott and I would oftentimes leave the girls behind to pursue extra curricular activities, Chasing skirts, dope deals etc.

        Believe it or not... there at the end... before I left to move down south...
 much of our conversations  drifted intoTalking about the Lord!
...  Scott's Mom Elaine,
 and all of the witnessing to us, her prayers,  and the fact so many of our friends were dropping like flies!
 all the close calls  we experienced personally, always seem to cause us to go there...

One of the most significant of those conversations happened when  the four of us, Tammy, Beth, Scott and I went over to Lake Michigan on a camping trip...

...Of course, we were well supplied with plenty of Buzzzzzz Material,
... Liquor, Beer, some Killer weed, and on this particular occasion we all dropped some very potent acid, {LSD}.

We were tripping our brains out, and Scott and I were driving Tammy and Beth crazy with all of our God Talk.

I think we literally saw God that night on that particular Acid Trip.

I remember how Scott and I went over to the edge of one of the sand dunes and built a large fire... We were looking up into this incredible star filled sky, with the sounds of  the waves crashing on the beach below us,
 and starting talking about how much we needed to turn our lives over to the Lord before it was too late...

...It hadn't been that long since Earl Moser had killed himself on New Years Eve by taking a Shotgun and shooting himself in the heart with it. 

Like us, He was strung out real bad...Shooting up Cocaine, Heroin, Drinking Heavily Etc...His girlfriend Karen had left him...
...  His Brotherinlaw, Gary Knight, had died in that work accident I told you about earlier. 
... His Step Dad, David Knight, Gary's older brother, also was killed at work in an accident.

 David worked at A-Color, and a semi-truck tractor crushed his skull while he was helping back the tractor up to a trailer in the loading dock.
Somehow or another the pin on the trailer pinched his head into the slot on the fifth wheel plate, killing him instantly.

I remember we were discussing all of these tragic events and many others that were happening all around us, and we were crying our eyes out promising each other...
 that we were tired of all this  partying and good times we were supposedly having,
   God must have really loved us,
 because He had spared us so many times from a multitude of incredibly close calls...
... In looking back again, It was incredibly prophetic, when Scott said to me,

"How awesome would it be, that when someone stopped by the house to score some drugs from me,  instead,... I would turn them onto Jesus instead of a bag of weed or a gram of cocaine."



...Looking back, its kind of funny how  many of our friends  complained, how Scott and I was always talking about God.
 Everytime we  got loaded, the more God talk we would get into.

...We were driving them all crazy!

...As I previously stated, God had loosed the hounds of heaven on me...But Satan had loosed the hounds of Hell on me also.

God was trying to Save me, and Satan was out to destroy me.

...THE BATTLE WAS RAGING!

 AND IT WAS TRULY A TOSS UP AT THIS POINT ON WHAT THE ULTIMATE OUTCOME WAS GOING TO BE!

...Another very important character in my story and in most of my early life, was introduced earlier..."BARRY HUDSON"

Barry is like a brother to me.  He is my Mother's youngest brother, which makes him my uncle.  Barry's only 6 months older than me so we were like brothers growing up.

    Before my Mom and Dad got divorced our family was very close and I got to spend a lot of time at my grandparents house.  I was growing up with my mom's younger brothers, Barry and Terry.  We played together, fought together and did all the things together little kids do, playing and growing up together.
   The closeness in our relationship continued on into adolesence, adulthood and beyond.  Barry and Terry both, at some point came to Kalamazoo and lived with us for awhile.  Unfortunately while growing up we all started experimenting with drinking and drugs in our early teens and it carried over into adulthood and as can be expected, drinking a few beers and smoking a little weed ever now and then had grown into full blown addictions, creating major problems in all of our lives.  Thats an altogether more involved story for another time but still necessary for you to know about in order to understand the magnitude and awesomeness of God's marvelous, miraculous power and divine intervention.

Tragedy is just around the corner but God's majesty will be revealed.  Painful as this story is, there is an aspect to this story that has to be told in order to bring comfort and hopefully healing to folks that I may never even meet in this life.

...The whole purpose in telling a story like mine, is somehow, someone, may benefit or receive some little something that will change their story for the glory of God and the advancement of His Kingdom.

There are a lot of players and many lessons to be learned along the way.  And that's the point!

All of us have a purpose and a mission in life. That's why we are here.  God created everyone of us for a specific reason and its my hope that someone discovers that purpose as a result of hearing how God has worked in my life and the lives of those that are also a part of this story!

........{To Be Continued}

"TO GOD BE THE GLORY!"

Brother Michael