Category: Christian Living

Trisha’s Book Is Making an Impact

Keep Your Hands in the Air When You’re on a Roller Coaster by Trisha Kennedy. This book is the story of a life-changing series of events that changed our lives forever. This story is being told to bring comfort to those going through their own crisis or to give insight to those who have loved ones going through a crisis. Our desire is for you to grow closer to the Lord as you read this book, becoming the person he created you to be. We also hope you can experience for yourself the gold nuggets of blessing God has planned for you. It truly is possible to learn to have joy and keep your hands in the air, even while on the roller coaster of life.

Trisha has taken our traumatic experience with Covid-19 and turned it into an encouraging primer for anyone going through life changing trauma.

Available in paperback or Kindle eBook on Amazon (click here or on the image above).

Take’s a Licking and Keeps on …

Can you finish the old slogan in the title? If you’re old enough, you will remember this catchy phrase from Timex about their popular and inexpensive wrist watches. John Cameron Swayze was the spokesman who would demonstrate the ruggedness of their watches by putting them through some very rough treatment.

I remember the commercials. The watches were attached to such violent things as boat motor propellors, washing machines, jack hammers and more. After such torture, the watch was held up to the camera and John would say, “Takes a licking and keeps on ticking!”

The watches were reliable because they were well designed and well made. They were popular for those reasons and their reasonable price. The designers and makers of the watches took great care that the watches could fulfill their purpose.

Our God designed us and made us for a purpose. We often go through some rough treatment physically, emotionally and spiritually. Nonetheless, we can “keep on ticking” because God made us to fulfill His purpose until He is ready to take us home.

Our God designed us and made us for a purpose. We often go through some rough treatment physically, emotionally and spiritually. Nonetheless, we can “keep on ticking” because God made us to fulfill His purpose until He is ready to take us home.

Recovering from COVID – Now What?

Many have followed our journey through our experiences with COVID-19. We were both taken ill by the virus. Trisha was quarantined for two weeks in a hotel in Charlotte and Jody was hospitalized, in Charlotte, for three months, followed by three months of physical therapy.

According to the medical team that cared for Jody, there was no medical reason for him to have survived. In the words of the lead pulmonologist, “God reached down and touched your body.” It is truly a miracle that Jody survived. For many weeks, he was the sickest person on the COVID floor.

This experience has given us a renewed vigor for serving the Lord and sharing his message of forgiveness and hope.

Trisha did an amazing and inspirational work of recording our reliance on the Lord throughout the most difficult months of our lives. Her diary of our journey can be seen at the Caringbridge website (click here).

Since returning to Texas from Charlotte, we have had the privilege of sharing our experience and telling of God’s miracle work at some Texas churches. Some of these can be viewed through the links below.

Calvary Baptist Church of Midlothian

Christ Fellowship, Lake Bridgeport, TX

Retta Baptist Church, Burleson, TX

Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?

“Bad boys, bad boys whatcha gonna do?  Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?”

The opening line of the theme song for the long running TV show “COPS” is a catchy reggae song first released by Inner Circle in 1997.  The full song goes on to speak of bad behavior and that no one will “give you no break” and “acting like a fool” does not deserve a break.  The lyrics of the song offer no hope for redemption to the “bad boys”.

The prophet Joel records the words of the Lord about the disobedience and judgement of the southern nation of Judah, God’s people, acting like fools and behaving like “bad boys”.  Joel records the plan for redemption of God’s people,  “And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (Joel 3:32).  Joel gives us the first lengthy description of “the day of the Lord”.

This is a reminder that as sinners (bad boys), no one gets a break and no break is due.  Their end is destruction and death.  As Christians, our calling is to tell the world (sinners) of the hope that is only in Jesus Christ.  Only he can turn “bad boys” into “redeemed boys”.

Why not start today, right now, with a new dedication to be about “the Father’s business” of telling those in your life about the Son.

Joel 3:32

And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

A Life Changing Quote – “Nobody drifts toward holiness.”

1Th 4:7 For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness.

Heb 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us,
Heb 12:2 looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the  joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

One of the “side effects” of these strange times is having time to sit and watch or listen to Bible teaching from well known and well proven Bible teachers. We have narrowed our picks to only a few of the dozens that are on television. On the internet one can find hundreds of “Bible” teachers, but one must be very careful about “internet preachers”.

One of the services we regularly watch is from Dr. David Jeremiah’s Turning Point broadcasts. Recently, the quote that struck me was “No one drifts toward holiness.” It’s meaning and implication should be very clear to every Christian. It is all to easy to “drift” away from the Lord as we get lazy in our walk with Him, as we get distracted by our circumstances or we get too busy with non-essential things.

I am reminded of a time, decades before cell phones, when I was on a lake in a very old motor-boat. I pulled the cord to start the motor and it would not start. After many attempts, I finally conceded that the motor was “kaput”. There was a light breeze and I thought, “I’ll just drift with the wind and it will take me to the boat ramp.” The wind was pushing me in the general direction of the boat ramp, but soon I saw that I was not going to land at the boat ramp. Instead, I was being taken to a place near the boat ramp that was filled with logs, reeds and and weeds. Remembering how this area looked I realized I would be stuck in the thick reeds one hundred yards or more from shore. I grabbed my paddle, leaned over the side of the boat and began paddling in the direction of the boat ramp. When I landed the boat, I was mid-way between the boat ramp and the thick reeds. Tired, sweaty and a little embarrassed, I walked to the boat ramp and found someone to tow the boat back to the boat ramp.

I ultimately made it to the boat ramp, but I could have had a better outcome. First, I should have decided sooner to begin paddling. Don’t wait to start “paddling” toward holiness. It requires a decision to do what is required to come closer to God’s standard of holiness.

Second, I had to make an effort and not simply let the wind (life, the world, circumstances) take me where it would.

Third, I had to use the paddle that was at hand. God gives us the right tools to learn about Him but we have to pick them up and use them.

So, the question is “Am I just drifting along as a Christian or am I going to put in the time and effort to move in the direction of holiness. What are you doing to “reach the boat ramp”?

A Stake in the Ground

A Stake in the Ground

While deployed as chaplains with the BGEA Rapid Response Team, Jody and Trisha met a wonderful, young couple (practically newlyweds) who were victims of Hurricane Michael.

She had invited Christ into her life, but she had not gone very far beyond that in her walk with the Lord.  He had felt God’s presence as he suffered through a terrible childhood, but he had never surrendered to Christ.   As a young adult, he found himself embroiled in a life of drugs, alcohol and poor choices.  Through the tragedies they experienced together and separately, they were brought together and were married.  They began to build a life together with a new-found purpose.  They tried to put their pasts behind them and hoped for a new start.

They had been married for only two months when Hurricane Michael came and destroyed their family home just as it had thousands of others.  As if there was not already enough tragedy in their lives, the storm heaped loss on the newly married couple.  While their physical lives were spared, the life they were building together seemed to have been lost.

Three months after the hurricane, very little had changed.  The storm seemed to have intensified their misery as the memories of their pasts brought regret and pain.  Fear of the future and the uncertainties of rebuilding held them in chains of doubt and despair.  Looking out from their camper each morning revealed the unchanged landscape of their destroyed home and debris strewn property.

Then, a glimmer of hope came when he landed a job at a nearby factory.  Some optimism began to creep in, but there was still the destroyed home and littered properly that reminded them daily of the hurricane.

She was one of the first to request help from Samaritan’s Purse when the disaster relief headquarters had been established in Panama City.  Yet it would be weeks before the team would arrive to start the demolition of their home.  Her anxiety grew as the day approached for the Samaritan’s Purse team to come.  The memories of life in that home were vivid and she felt like she was losing her home all over again.

The Samaritan’s Purse team arrived, along with Jody and Trisha, the chaplains from BGEA Rapid Response Team.  Rather than simply tearing into the work, the team gently spoke with the overwhelmed man and wife and then began the process of recovering what they could safely remove from the home.  The chaplains comforted the young couple and soon they both began to share their past, their fears about the future and the difficulties of facing tomorrow.

As the wife and Trisha stepped away to talk alone, the husband and Jody began a deeper conversation.    The young man picked up a long stick and jokingly commented on how straight it was and that it would make a good spear.  He then went on to say that he had acknowledged God and even prayed to God during his troubled past, yet he had never cried out to the Lord to come into his life or to forgive him.  His prayers up to now were requests to deliver him from difficult circumstances.

As the conversation moved from things of the past to the possibilities of the future, Jody asked the young man to read along as they walked together through Steps to Peace with God.  The young man read aloud along with Jody as they moved through each step.  As the final step lead to the prayer, the young man read the prayer aloud and with wet eyes he acknowledged his sincerity in repentance and trust in Christ through faith.

Jody commented that no matter what had happened in the past, the young man could view today as a stake in the ground, representing a turning point in his life.  At this, the young man took a step forward, raised the stick and forcefully plunged it into the wet ground at his feet and exclaimed, “Yes, just like this!”  What a beautiful picture of a new birth and symbol of a new life with Christ, marking today as a turning point, a stake in the ground.