Begin Again

When you look at the journey you are on in life, there are so many twists and turns and very few people actually follow the path they map out for themselves in those teenage planning or “dreaming” years.  God's ultimate plan for us is to spend eternity with Him in Heaven.  What happens in the middle is what we call life.  Regardless of our best laid plans, thankfully because of His endless forgiveness, we can always start over. 

I can’t even remember all of the dreams I have dreamed.  That’s why I know that God doesn’t just place one dream in my heart.  I believe he wants me to be happy, content, and realize that I am to store my treasures in Heaven and not in the corner office, my garage, or the local bank.  Tonight as I was writing in my prayer journal I had been reading in Psalms for inspiration.  David says that a man who has nothing more than his breath when weighed with a man who has many riches, the two combined equal nothing but breath.  In the grand scheme of things the material things or anything we place abundant value on in this world doesn’t amount to anything compared to the relationship we have with God and what awaits us in eternity.

This summer has been one of the hardest seasons in all my life.  As I look back on times when I lost jobs, battled life threatening illnesses, and buried loved ones, nothing seems to compare to the battle within Rob as I know him this summer.  I launched one of the most successful speaking tours I have ever been able to do.  I am so very proud of my Faith Is A Factor platform, but, the devil was very disappointed in it and did everything he could to destroy my love for God.  He has done everything possible to hang as a dark cloud over the glory and honor I wanted to give to the Lord for showing me a better way to deal with depression.

I made terrible decisions throughout parts of this year.  Those decisions cost me on so many levels, because I found myself in a constant struggle of impulse vs. rationality.  Fortunately, victory has prevailed and as God’s Word clearly explains, we will prosper and He will answer the pleas of the righteous.

In my younger days everything I did was about pride.  It was all about outperforming someone else.  Just because I grew up in a trailer park to cotton mill workers, didn’t mean I wasn’t going to be the most successful person to emerge from Cochran’s hollow.  I wasted too many years storing up treasures on earth…in the corner office, on the business card, in the local bank.  Fortunately I have always served the Lord, but I never truly grasped the clarity of a man’s relationship with his Savior until the last couple of years, magnified even more this year.

Already on a downward spiral, I wrote the sermon, “Faith Is A Factor,” and delivered it with good reviews.  I was able to tour multiple states and reach new brothers and sisters and patients who suffer the same illness as I.  Unfortunately, and not to paint myself as the victim, because I am not, my brother was brutally and in my mind unfairly killed in a car crash at the end of June.  I still can’t understand how a man who never had an enemy, never had a sickness, and was so full of joy had to go before his younger weaker, sicker, sad and depressed brother.  I allowed this grief to overcome me and dominate my life for the last fifteen weeks. 

Realizing that I was in a state of chaos and on a collision course with disaster, I decided to practice what I was so effortlessly preaching….

Completely turning your life over to God is humbling.  When you really make that connection where you understand that He is in total control and you remove the negatives, regardless of how much it hurts or what the consequences might be, peace really begins to pass understanding.  You see I will never understand my brother’s death.  I am not meant to understand it, not in this life anyway.  Regardless of the nights I wake screaming his name or how much I wish I had changed the pattern of that last day, it is done and out of my control.

Through all of the panic attacks and the struggles to survive other snowballing disasters, God emerges with a plan.  He uses the original talents He gave me.  He uses His people, such as Courtney, Sherry, Gina, Kim, Estee, Wayne, LuAnne, Becky, Jean, Nell, Paul, Angie, Tracy, Tonya, Cindy, Suzanne, Michele, Laura, Len  and so many others to encourage and guide me toward making the right decisions to overcome circumstances that had me on the path to destruction.

Finally, I am not a man who cares what others think as much I care what others KNOW and believe in their hearts about God, not about me.  I can be victorious and overcome for Him.  I can use the talents He gave me, to begin again, so humbly and so willingly to take each day one step at a time.  Joel Osteen recently put out a devotional that God doesn’t want His children to suffer in the bad economy the way others do, and this is so true, even in dark times, as the scriptures tell us, our God is a God of abundance in everything, including happiness.

As I read back over my prayer journal entries just in the last few weeks, I can see how God aligned everything for me.  How in my desperation, He worked more quickly, He knew I needed fast results.  Now with His new blessings for me and the new “old” journey I am about to embark on, is a full circle example of embracing the simplicity of using our talents and perhaps this second time around I will learn to glorify Him even more.

God is a giver of many chances.  His forgiveness is endless.  His love is without condition or limits.  So then should be our service in His name.  By the grace and mercy of God I begin again and that is His plan, and today that is all I need to understand.

My love to all….

The Simple Life

A couple of years ago my good friends Ricky and Kim Johnson Dunaway moved from Ohatchee back to Kim’s hometown of Scottsville, Kentucky.  I have been meaning to visit them for some time, but we all know about good intentions.  We let life get in the way.  Fortunately, Kim and Ricky continually encouraged me to visit and with my recent “Faith Is A Factor” tour I received a special invitation from the Elders at the Scottsville Church of Christ to speak.  I had an amazing experience on this trip.

Scottsville, Kentucky is nestled in the south central area of the bluegrass state.  My initial plan was to take I-65 north through Cullman, Decatur, and eventually into Nashville and up to Bowling Green.  I would then head back southeast for about twenty miles or so to Scottsville.  Ricky suggested that I take the scenic route just south of Chattanooga across Monteagle mountain and then take hwy 231 outside Murphreesboro, into Lebanon, and straight across the Kentucky line into Scottsville.  I made great time and truly enjoyed the drive.  A couple of days before I left, my friend Austin Brown and I had corresponded about our prayer journals, and he promised me he would give me a report in a few months on how his was going for a “year-end sermon” I am planning.  I used the windshield time for a lot of traditional conversation with the Lord, especially since I couldn’t write and drive.  As the east coast was bracing for Hurricane Irene, Tennessee was enjoying beautiful sunny skies.  The amazing views were inspirational across the mountain and it was so appropriate to express my gratitude and deepest thoughts to God.

Once I arrived in Kentucky, I visited with my friends for a while and we enjoyed some southern cooking for lunch and then decided to venture outside town a short distance to a Mennonite community.  If you have never had the opportunity to witness the lifestyle of the Amish country, you have no idea what you are missing.  I had heard stories from Ricky and Kim, but was not prepared for the simplicity and purity of life these faith driven people live.  I was not surprised by the fact there is no electricity, but the creativity and volume of production these families yield from the land is amazing.  They use the strongest horses, manmade tools, and their backs to grow the most beautiful crops.

As we toured jam houses, furniture shops, produce stands, and “pick your own pepper” fields, the friendly and humble nature of the Mennonites warmed my heart.  From early ages these spiritually grounded overachievers develop the strongest work ethic I have ever seen.  It reminds me of stories my Mom and Grandmother told me about their cotton farming days. 

One of the most intriguing characteristics I picked up unanimously from this community was joy.  There was no complaining, laziness or arrogance like you might find in your local store or restaurant.  Long lines or staring tourists didn’t seem to impact them at all.  Looking into their eyes, all you could see was understanding and kindness, no judgment.  I kept thinking to myself as we drove around in air conditioned cars watching them drive their horse drawn wagons and carriages, most of us were judging them.  “How do they live like this?”  “Why do they believe they can’t watch any TV or have any electricity?”  “Why must they cover their heads and wear long dresses in the summer and all the boys wear suspenders?”  This community lives a simple life where they are not trying to keep up with the neighbors.  They are not stressed out by the need for materialistic success. 

I certainly didn’t leave Scottsville, KY planning to go join a Mennonite community or buy a patch of land and start completely living off my harvest, or giving up my car, TV, computer, etc.  I did however, come away with a much better understanding of contentment.  I realized this community was not there for my entertainment but for a lesson in life that I needed to learn.  Those of us who truly are trying to live the Christian life are not that different from the Mennonites.  We serve the Lord first and realize that we store our treasures in Heaven, not here on earth.  We want for nothing, because God supplies all basic needs and motivation.

I will never stop believing that God wants me to dream and He wants me to accomplish as much in my life as my heart desires as long as it doesn’t interfere or diminish my love for Him.  I keep thinking back to what a bright young speaker named Renee Zeringue recently said during a sermon.  The void we feel within us can on be filled by God.  If we don’t allow Him to be first, we will never know true joy and satisfaction.  The perfect simple message for the most complicated of lives.  I am thankful for my friends Ricky and Kim, the Elders at the Church in Scottsville, the Mennonites, and for a wonderful God who teaches me inspirational life lessons.

All glory to God, Almighty!

Dreaming: Good or Bad?

I have a good friend who lies down and goes to sleep every night as soon as the head hits the pillow.  This friend has very strict rules about not watching TV in bed, not reading in bed, not working on the laptop in bed.  For the most part, the bed is for sleep.  “You must train your body and mind the bed is for sleeping!”  This is the constant lecture I receive.  Very sound advice because I work from my bed constantly.  I watch TV there, I read there, I write there, and I talk on the phone and Facebook there.  I also toss and turn every single night and dream extremely vivid dreams there.  My friend….never dreams or doesn’t remember them if they do.

I wake up in the morning absolutely exhausted from the dreams I have dreamed.  They are so vivid and so real.  Several doctors have advised me over the years that it is a symptom of the mental disorder.  When I worked in a restaurant, I cooked all night in my sleep.  When I worked in a retail jewelry store, I sold watches all night in my sleep.  When I traveled as a marketing director, I flew on an airplane every night in my sleep.  My mind never stopped and never rested.  It has been this way my entire life, and bordering on forty years old, it has almost worn this body and mind out.

Over the years I have been prescribed sleep aids such as Ambien, etc.  The problem is that with Bipolar Disorder, it has an adverse effect and you sit straight up in the bed about two hours after you fall asleep, wide awake.  It is a result of the chemical imbalance.

For me, dreaming has not always been detrimental.  My dreams are so vivid and creative that I have used them to write, develop marketing campaigns, and even visit with relatives who have passed away.  I often see my dreams as a gift from God because it’s my way of communicating with my beloved grandmothers and my Dad since they passed away.  I can remember very detailed conversations when I wake up in the morning and questions answered that helped me to bring closure to the death of a loved one.

Back on June 25 when my older brother Tony passed away from his car accident, I was devastated.  I lost sleep because I couldn’t stop thinking of him and I couldn’t manage my grief.  I didn’t see him in my sleep, I just tossed and turned because I felt guilty that it happened to him and I felt regret that I was not a better brother to him.  For over eleven weeks I have suffered thinking how will I ever find closure to his death when there was no proper opportunity to say goodbye.  He was taken from us abruptly.  Death was instant, and there was no open casket or no possible way for us to view his remains, or have the “traditional goodbye.”  I barely was able to compose a sentence through his entire eulogy.

I feel that I have spent most of this time in shock.  Not fully accepting the fact that he is gone and not coming back.  Concentrating more on regret and the “what if’s?”

Last weekend was Labor Day weekend.  A wonderful and loving group of friends took me to Fairhope, AL near Mobile Bay and Gulf Shores to rest and recuperate.  Saturday, September 3 would have been Tony’s forty-fifth birthday.  I was devastated and no matter how hard I tired, I couldn’t be the life of the party that I wanted to be.  In fact, I lay in bed until lunch time on Saturday, just dozing in and out of sleep, mostly too sad to muster the energy to socialize.  Finally, one of my friends came and kissed me on the cheek, woke me up and said we are all waiting for you.  I agreed to get up and shower and go out for lunch.  There was a triple red flag at the beach due to Tropical Storm Lee and the wind and waves were unbelievably intense.  I put on a little show for my friends to make them laugh by doing my own version of a weather report.  I gave a high energy performance, we even uploaded it to Youtube, but before long, sadness reclaimed control.

The day progressed and we had wonderful meals, great conversation and all the friends encouraged me to talk about Tony and share stories of our childhood, and so I did.  They sat and listened intently as I verbalized memories of laughter and love from years gone by.  I told of our varying interests as young boys, different styles as men in our twenties, and complete opposite career pursuits.  The one thing we did have in common was our respect for each other.  We never fought, and if there was a disagreement, we just didn’t discuss it because we never wanted to do anything to jeopardize our relationship. 

On Saturday night, September 3, the day that I should have been celebrating Tony’s birth, I drifted to sleep and for the very first time in the eleven weeks since his tragic accident I dreamed of him.   I dreamed I was riding In that old blue Supra, just as plain as day he cruised around the square in Jacksonville past the McDonald’s and all along the campus.  In my dream, he was dressed in a suit.  The one picked out to bury him in.  He looked handsome and healthy.  I kept telling him over and over, “Tony you are dead, you are gone.”  He just kept smiling at me and saying, “I know.”  I rolled the window down and let the air hit my face as tears streamed down.  I kept turning back to look at him to see when he was going to be gone.  Finally, he said, to me, “I am always going to be here, in your dreams.”

When I awoke on Sunday morning, my pillow was soaked in the tears I had cried.  I have complained for years of the dreams I had to endure.  The recurring nightmares and the endless dreams of work that caused me to wake up so exhausted in the mornings; however, at that moment, I realized, I couldn’t trade that dream for anything.  It was a step in the direction of closure.  By no means am I over it.  I don’t think I ever will be.  Still, I trust him and believe that when I desperately need the comfort, there he will be in my dreams. 

For those who believe there is no God, how do you explain the miracle of the mind?  The subconscious state of mind that satisfies the soul and mends the broken heart is undeniable.  God exists as the Almighty, All-Knowing, and All Powerful God.  He comes through for us in all forms and fashions.  I am learning to be thankful for some of the suffering I have had to endure in life, especially when it draws me nearer to Him and His hand can turn a handicap into a mechanism for healing.

I would say the title to this blog is about as rhetorical as one can get.  I’ll vote that dreaming is good, and oh how I pray that God never lets me stop.

Chase your dreams, for in those moments you may find the answers to the uncertainty of reality.