“I just knew one of these days, God was going to strike me dead with lightning and ZOT! There I’d be, nothing but a grease spot on the ground. But you know what? He never did, because that’s not who he is.”
I listened to that tape for over ten years. I didn’t belong to a church when I was growing up and when I became a teenager and tried to join the ones in walking distance to my home, they all said no.
That’s not a joke, that’s true. And they all said it in different ways.
The first one said I needed papers. Proof I’d been baptized. And sponsors who would be committed to my spiritual growth. Problem is I didn’t know if I had a pedigree and I surely didn’t know any adult sponsors to ask. Joining a country club would have been easier than joining that church.
The second church didn’t allow unsupervised children there and I needed to get my parents and then we could talk.
The Baptist church even turned me down and that confused me because I heard they’ll take anybody.
It just so happened I babysat for this really cool couple next door and whenever someone visited their church that they thought I might like, they brought me the cassette. The two I remember most are Petra and Isaac Air Freight. Well, I remember their names anyway.
What I didn’t remember is the name of the lightening bolt dude.
I kept that tape and listened to it on an off from the early 80’s until well after I finally joined a church in 1993.
I wish I still had it.
It’s important to me because it’s the only Gospel I heard in that time frame.
I’d go my own way for a while looking into Buddhist things, or tarot cards or even Wiccan traditions and I’d come across the tape again and listen and be reminded that there IS a God out there who loves me. There is a God who is benevolent and kind and isn’t going to leave me dead on the side of the road.
I finally found that God for myself and I am thankful. And sometimes I do wonder who that was on the tape. I laid that down years ago. Needing to know. My luck, I’d make an idol out of the person and what if he turned out to be a jerk in real life, what then?
Would that negate the message?
It could have back in the day.
Something awesome happened while in the middle of this craziness that is my life right now, I stumbled upon a Periscope video made by a Christian Artist I enjoy today and he mentioned how much he loves Michigan and how it was his mainstay and livelihood back in his early career from 1980-1982. I just sat there and stared at my screen.
No way.
I mean the video is 8 months old. That just can’t be. And then the other day, he posted another video and again randomly stated how much he loves Michigan.
Okay ya’ll that is where I lived and went to high school.
I had to look into it, so I found and downloaded his very first Christian Comedy CD from 1989, and you know what, the voice matches and so do some of the stories, at least a little. The lightening story isn’t there, and I honestly think his closing song is really pretty cheesy, but it sounds like him.
I’ll never know for sure, nor can I ever prove it. What stands out to me though, if it IS him, it’s before he was famous, or probably any good really and yet God used him to keep reaching out to me.
I mattered to God.
He mattered to God.
Not fame.
Or greatness.
Just a guy, a young one at that, doing what he knew best, to the best of his ability.
And it made a difference.
I think that’s us as well.
We don’t have to be rich or famous or some kind of superstar to make a difference in someone’s life.
We just have to show up and be who we are right now.
God can use that.
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