The Unexpected Cross
In mid-July I was able to take a sabbatical in preparation for the coming ministry year. I would love to say it was all peaceful and relaxing, but God had some other plans in mind. It started out with me crying while leaving the parking lot on Friday at the end of the workday. That hit me out of nowhere, but I was in the midst of planning Recovery Church and my eldest son’s wedding, my youngest son’s college tour, and my daughter moving back home even though she was far from the Lord at that moment. I was a bit of a mess.
So that Friday I had a concert to go to with my wife, during Canal-fest. We made a date out of it only to discover the artist cancelled, and we weren’t notified because the tickets were a gift. So that was frustrating to me. That same weekend my home theater died, which was like losing a member of the family as I am a movie buff. Then my board game group was cancelled indefinitely as my friend had to work overtime. Then I tried to take a day of solitude at my friend’s cottage and that got majorly interrupted with texts and phone calls the week of the wedding ... I finally said “God, I can’t escape ... you have my full attention.”
Throughout that month God was doing some heart work in me. You see I am typically a glass half empty guy, and that works as a counselor because I see the dysfunction right away. But as a newly licensed pastor, God had to impress upon me that even a glass half full perspective doesn’t cut it. I have to learn to rely on His perspective of how He sees his people and their situations. Especially with Recovery Church coming to fruition.
Even after my son’s wedding, my heart hurt for days when he moved out. Through his cancer journey, Wes became a real bright light for the Lord and our house grew dimmer as a result. God had to remind me that this was not a time to mourn, but a time to rejoice that we launched him well with God’s plan for his life. In that same timeframe he landed a teaching job in Orchard Park by sharing his love for life and finding his purpose as a part of his testimony. He beat out over 200 applicants in his first interview.
Around that same time my daughter who became very liberal and a LGTBQ sympathizer when she moved out a year and a half ago, moved back home and rededicated herself to Jesus. God gave me a vision of this at a church planting conference earlier that year where God demanded I surrender her to Him so he could write her story. After wrestling it out with Him, I relented and instantly He gave me a vision of her standing next to me at Recovery Church. Even though I loved her like the prodigal dad when she returned, God singled her out and showed her His purpose for her to become a volunteer fire fighter as she was overwhelmed and gave her life back to Jesus. As Recovery Church launched, she was there.
God continued to show up and show out while at the end of sabbatical we took my youngest to look at Christian colleges and rented a beach house in North Carolina. There I finally got some rest and perspective. While strolling Folly beach, my son started taking pictures of the sunset and I decided to join in, and I snapped a bunch. I didn’t look at them until the ride home as Jill was driving, and one seemingly unremarkable pictured flipped sideways as we hit a bump and God revealed His perspective in the sunsets’ reflection.
There was no one or anything on the beach that day which could have cast the shadow of the cross in the water at the center of this picture ... but God. Tilt the picture sideways if you need to see it better, as God had to shift my perspective in order to see clearly. And no, AI was not used in any way to take nor enhance this image ... for my fellow skeptics out there.
“Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.” Proverbs 3:5