There is no doubt that I am caught in the middle of what I always though it meant to be “holy” and where I am heading. The journey has been a struggle for me for sure, but as of this moment, I like where I am at and where I am heading.

When I am in my car, I usually listen to Pandora radio, I have a pretty big selection of stations I listen to. I discovered this unknown for the most part country boy, his name is Colter Wall. I LOVE his music even though it is Country music. This guy is the real deal, storyteller that captures your attention right away. One of his songs is called “Living on the Sand” and boy did it catch my attention. (it’s not my favorite song by him but….) Here is part of the lyrics, I will also post the video with all the lyrics.

Forgive me, forgive me
Don’t it sound more clear
When I’m screaming it day after day?
I’ve lost all my patience
I’m wasted on waiting on
Making my next mistake

I’ve been living on the sand
Don’t take much to guide my hand
Far from promised land
On the sand

Of course, this song is based on Matthew 7:26:

And everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand. And the rain fell, and the floods came, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell, and great was the fall of it.” Matthew 7:26 ESV

Basic Christianity! This is probably one of the very first Scriptures that I learned as a new believer 40 years ago. And yet today it is as fresh as ever.

Don’t be deceived you cannot purposely live in sin and have the Spirit dwell within you – we as Christians have come to believe we can live on both sides of the fence and still walk in the power of the Holy Spirit. There is a blatant difference between knowingly living in sin and falling down…..the difference is repentance!!

God defiantly has me on a journey, where am I headed? I am not sure, what am I supposed to do? I am not sure yet. I DO KNOW that something within my heart and spirit has shifted.

For the last couple years, it has been very difficult when it comes to my spiritual life. Slowly I have moved away from Church, worship, the word and I’ve started finding fault with the church in general. Listening to people talk about coming out of the structure of a church for various reasons. I struggle with this on many levels, I am not sure how I feel about this moment.

There are many flaws in the church, and I’ve written about them, preached about them and prayed about them. The focus it seems always ends up on “growing the church numbers, growing the finances, building a new building. There are good points in all of this and bad points in it. I sit in a big beautiful church building, with millions of $$ worth of sound equipment, camera’s, lights, a coffee shop and well the list goes on. While right outside people are sleeping on the street, hungry, broke, addicted and mentally unstable. SO, I look at the budget of the church the bulk of the money they bring in is to just support the church building, staff etc. with a fraction going out to the community. Most denominations support some type of “Mission” program, and they HAVE to pay their part of the total budget to this.

I will never forget the church I was pastor of in California. A building that was about 50 years old and in serious need of many upgrades etc. Over the stage, ceiling tiles started to fall out because they were rotten and would not hold any longer. For me as a young pastor, wanting to make a mark in the world wanted to change everything, make it more appealing to a younger generation. Update everything, take out the old and put in the new. Now we were a pretty small congregation and already lived on a tight budget, but this HAD TO BE DONE if we wanted to grow. So, I convinced the board to take out a loan to pay for it all. Of course the next few years we had to cut “ministry” programs and tighten up to pay for all of this. NOW, with all that said it’s not all bad, of course we want a nice building, after all this is the HOUSE of GOD!!

A couple weeks before we started construction, on a Sunday morning a new young family visited our church. I was pretty excited to see this, that is the goal for us. After service I hurried over to make sure I could introduce myself to them and invite them back. While talking with them, I asked “how did you find this church” they said they just moved into the neighborhood and decided to try us, then he said, “when I walked in and saw the ceiling tiles had fallen and a few of them hanging on by a thread, I knew that you cared more about the people in the neighborhood and community than pouring money into this building, and we love that”

Here I am February 1st, 2023, and I’m wondering what happened? My life is so out of balance, my spiritual life is out of balance, and I don’t know why. Well, the truth is I didn’t really look for a reason why, I just kept getting further and further away from who I am and who I was created to be. I kept asking God to help me come back to where I have peace and joy in my life no matter what is going on around me. I’ve had a bad attitude about Church and what goes on within the walls of church etc etc. Slowly and surely, I’ve been creeping back searching and praying. Yesterday I went to the Prayer room for the 1st time in a couple months at least. While I was there, I realized that it’s not a magic wand that God waves over me to get my attention, but it is me that needs to humble myself and make the moves back to my place in the kingdom. Not that I feel like I lost my salvation or anything like that, just felt dead inside and to be honest a little judgmental of everything and everyone. SO, today is the first day of my journey, I thought I would document it and share it with whoever wants to see it with the hope that it will help someone else. After all if a man who pastored for 20 years can come to a place like this anyone can.