Really getting hit upside the head!

In my last post I talked about the first time God slapped me upside the head. Now I'm going to talk about the second time I got hit upside the head. In this case I truly got hit in the head. It happened a few days before Christmas 0f 2006 and at the time I was 30 years old. I was outside trying to take down the old garage door at our first house. I thought that I could do this on my own. Let's just say that when forty pounds with a metal end hit you on the head it does not turn out well.

We were at the ER in South Bend getting my head checked out when I told my wife that my heart felt like it was racing. She is a OB nurse and tried to check my pulse. She could not count as fast as my heart was beating. When the ER nurse came in we told her what was going on. It is amazing how fast people move when you say that you are having problems with your heart. To make a long story short I spent the night in the Heart & Vascular area of the hospital. I was diagnosed as having a heart condition called atrial fibrillation. It is not a life threatening issue and can be controlled through medicine. Also, it is something that normally happens in older people.

Looking back on it I believe that God was showing me two things that I needed to learn. First is that you can not always do things on your own. As I get further in my walk with Christ I have gotten to this point with the help of a lot of different people. From pastors at Nappanee Missionary Church to people within our small church and to friends and co-workers. I appreciate all of the conversations that I have had with these individuals.

The second thing that I believe God was trying to show me was that I still needed to make changes in my life. It was another year and a half before I realized that I needed to start hearing God's word again. Another change that I had to make was in my eating habits and what I was truly living for. I needed to take into consideration what effect my actions had on my wife and two kids. At this point in my life I was still not where I needed to be. I was making changes to help get me where I needed to go. There are two more times were God slapped me upside the head and I will talk about those in future post.

First wake up call from God

As I talked about in my last post I believe that there have been multiple times were God has slapped me upside the head. Although I did not realize it at the time I believe the first time that God did this was in December 2002. This is one of the hardest things for me to talk about for two reasons. One is that I have to admit that I had an addiction and two I lost my Grandma at this time.

First is my addiction to alcohol. I was at a point in my life where I was spending too much time in a bar. What hit me was that when I walked into the bar the bartender had my beer waiting for me when I got to her. This was a sign to me that I was spending to much time at this place. I had my first drink when I was fifteen and I continued to drink throughout high school. The college years were worse, but I always told myself that I could stop. I would stop for awhile and then pick up right were I left off.

Second is the loss of my Grandma. She was one of the strongest persons that I have ever met. She had a battle with Ovarian cancer that lasted longer than most with that type of cancer. When she was first told she had cancer she said that she had lived a good life and she was ready for whatever was in store for her. She ended up seeing three of her grandchildren married and also her first great-grandchild.

This is where God slapped me upside the head. The night that my grandma passed on I was at the bar doing what I was normally doing. I could not drive myself home that night and had to have my sister and brother-in-law come pick me up and take me to my parents house. At this point I realized that something had to change. Ten days after my grandma passed I went out with an amazing (hot) girl for the first time. This girl happened to have a three and a half year old daughter that was so cute. They are now my wife and daughter. God took one angel from me and replaced her with two.

I have always believed that everything happens for a reason and that there is a God. At the time that this all took place I was not ready to accept Christ into my life. It took me a long time and more head slaps before I started to follow Christ. I will write about more of these head slaps in the posts that follow.

Getting slapped upside the head.....by God

As I look back on this past Friday's events I believe it was a moment where God was, as I say, slapping me upside the head. I went out to go shopping at the first store at 4 am and then to the second store by 5 am. This is the first time that I have ever went shopping that early on Black Friday. The events that happened at the second store may have been the worst behavior of "adults" that I have ever seen in person. I now call Black Friday the "day of the devil" because of what I witnessed.

I believe that God was trying to show me what my family needs to focus on during this Christmas season. Christmas is not about the gifts that you get for your kids or the amount of money that you spend. What it is about is the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! This is what we all need to remember during this time of the year. While we were putting up our Christmas tree and decorations I asked Jackson (3) what Christmas was about and he said "Jesus' birthday!" This is what I want my kids to think of when we talk about Christmas and not about what gift they got this year and that year.

When I step back and take a look at my life I see many times where God slapped me upside the head. Over the next few post I will talk about these times in my life. I will also be sharing my story this coming Sunday with my small church.

This is something that I wrote a couple of weeks ago.

As I sit here at 2:15 am on a Sunday morning wondering why God wants to keep me awake I ask the question What if? This has been the topic for the Senior High on Wednesday nights for a few weeks now. Now maybe I need to ask myself these questions also. I have many questions that go through my head, but I will only put down a few.
1. What if God wants me to downsize my house? Yesterday I had my small group over to my house for fellowship and food. As we pull into my neighborhood one of the guys makes the comment “Oh this is a rich neighborhood.” I have to say that I felt guilty, ashamed and convicted all at the same time. He did not mean anything by his comment, but it has made me ask some questions to myself. If we downsized it would free up money to be able to have multiply effects. We could give more money to the church, more to charities, and be able to go on mission trips. To me these are all positive outcomes.
2. What if God wants to call me into ministry on a full time basis? This is a question that I have been asking God for a while now. He called me into youth ministries as a small group leader and it is not something that I would have normally done. On a weekly basis I pray for wisdom from God to show me what I need to talk about with my guys. I believe that our group has gone well and will only get better from here on. I do not have an answer to this question. As I keep praying on this I know that God will give me an answer.
3. What if I could go back and do things over again? I have to say that I would have to do everything the same way. The reason is that if I changed something I would not be the person that I am today. I could not know what addiction is and it would completely change my testimony. As I have told my small group, you can not look back on the past, but you can change the future.
These are a few of the questions that I ask myself. As I work on developing a better relationship with God I’m excited about what the future holds for my family and me. Jackson reminded me this week about something when looking at an A+ by saying “Daddy that is where Jesus died.” All I could say was yes he did and for that I will be forever grateful that he died for my sins.