The Great Bean Counter Conspiracy

            The Great Bean Counter Conspiracy

        Yesterday, July 26^th, as I watched CNN they announced that IRA investment had reached a level last achieved almost five years ago.  In other words it has taken five years to return to the level we were at prior to the Market Crash of 2008.  They announced it as if it was some significant milestone. I found it to be a bit ironic that it happened forty-four years to the day after our first Moon Landing.  It was a high point in American history that we have equaled, but never surpassed.

     Every boom or major advance in industry from the Civil War till today has been followed by a period of stagnation.  Each crash was only ended by the next big advance or a period of war. The industrial boom that supplied the Civil War, was followed by the railroad expansion, the steel boom, the birth of the auto and aviation industries, World War I, the automation of the auto and aviation industries, World War II, the infrastructure boom, the technology boom, the computer boom, the dot.com boom, the housing boom/bubble and a number of energy crisis interspersed along the way. 

     The last and ongoing slowdown has been caused in large part by the development of the robotic and computer control systems that have replaced large numbers of workers.  Those workers displaced by this last boom are no longer needed and will only survive by adapting or creating a new skill that meets some new demand that society has not yet realized needs to be fulfilled.

     The stock crash of 08 caught the bankers and business with their pants down and almost destroyed America as we know it.  Millions of people lost their life savings due to blind investment by institutional investors that did not question the investments they put their client’s money in.  Their job was simply to put it somewhere and many did not care where that was.

     After “The Great Bailout” many of the Bean Counters realized there was a problem.  Banks froze capital and investments with a new plan to just hold their own and not grow, but to survive and definitely not collapse.  As the institutional investors started investing in the market again a light went on.  There was no need to take risks on investments.  If they just sat tight and did nothing the institutional money would grow the companies and they would look sound and solvent. Even if in reality they did absolutely nothing.

      It was the perfect financial storm.  Do nothing but watch the investments roll in and take no risks.  With interest rates in the tank, investors had nowhere else to go. The only threat would be inflation.  The government bean counters went along with the program and gave figures that pronounced little or no inflation. 

       Individuals know better as their buying power constantly decreases.  Jobs have slowly increased but not at a rate to even keep up with the new people entering the market.  The present administration swears things are getting better, but the real question is, in comparison to what?

       I will have to admit there seems to be a more positive attitude in America.  To me it stems from the hope that things are not getting noticeably worse.  The problem with that view is that things are not getting noticeably better either.  The only hope at present is that Americans are learning to get by with less and thereby lowering their level of pain.

       Recently I read that the level of the national debt per person has exceeded the annual median income of America.  That means over half of Americans owe more than they make per year as income to the national debt.  It is a number that is getting progressively worse.  The debt is not being addressed.  The new tactics of the Bean Counters of America is to sit and do nothing but count the money they are raking in from institutional investors.  The stock market balloon is being pumped to the max.  The only question is, what will burst the bubble. 

    Will it be the national debt?  The constant rise of entitlement programs?  The collapse of the dollar? The rise of the price of oil? Some foreign market collapse? It does not matter what it is.  The point is that it is a bubble, and all bubbles bust sooner or later, especially if they are ignored by those with the responsibility to fix the problem.  As long as the bankers, businesses and bean counters are making money they will not address the problem.  They are the ones creating the problem, but as long as the cash is flowing their direction, why fix it?

  The President and Congress are certainly not going to address the problem as long as they are in office. Even the Supreme Court is contributing to the problem as they make millions of people eligible for benefits with the stroke of a pen. It might pay to get a place in the country where you can be totally self- sufficient.  The only problem with that is that the local tax collectors will tax you right off of the property.  Enjoy life while you can, before government figures a way to tax that too.

Three Things God Can't Do, If You Believe Him

                                                              
       Do dates and times mean anything? Well the 22nd of January, 2004 will be important to me as long as I continue to draw a breath of air.  It was literally the first day of the rest of my life.  If one has been dead and managed to come back, that tends to get your attention. Actually, this was one of the last major events in my life.  Is it right to start at the end?  It doesn’t really seem to matter. Lots of dates seem to be important to us. Our birthday, the day we got married, and the day we got out of the Army could all be important to us.

        When you wake up and don’t really know where you are,  with a doctor you don’t know from Adam leaning over you and listening to your heart with a stethoscope, it might seem a little strange.  When he asks you how you are feeling, the only witty answer you can come up with is, “I feel like I have a six hundred pound gorilla on my chest.” It really gets strange when the doctor starts talking about being lucky to be alive. Then he says something about having lost you twice and putting some kind of things in your heart. The doctor then asks you questions like you are some kind of computer. “Do you drink?” “Do you smoke?”  “When did you quit?”  “How much did you smoke?”  “You need to lose some weight,” he says. Finally, here is, something I can give a positive answer to. “I have lost eighty pounds over the last six months,” I say, trying to smile. “That’s good,” he says, “If you hadn’t, we probably wouldn’t be having this conversation.” I am thinking, “I thought that was the whole point of losing weight.” My attitude is starting to get a little sour when all of a sudden the light comes on to what he is saying.  Having lost all that weight actually did help save my life!  All of a sudden, I feel a little bit better about all this.  However, the gorilla returned to his seat, and I went back to sleep.

     The next time I remember waking up my wife and daughters were standing by my bed. I don’t really know how long I slept, but it was about eight or nine in the morning when the ambulance took me to the hospital in Baltimore. So, considering my family came from Indiana, it must have been awhile.

      Who am I that I am writing a book about my experiences and my understanding of them?  Very simply, I am nothing and nobody. So, what makes me feel I have something to say that may interest you?  How about a common bond, in that we are both seeking to know the will of God in our lives!  At least it is my hope that is our common bond.

        Why start with a testimony?  Well, first, it gives you an insight about me and where I am coming from.  It is not my desire to have you waste your time reading something you think is just a nice story.  However, I will try to tell it in such a way that you don’t have to use toothpicks to hold your eyes open. Yet, I want you to know that everything said in this book is the truth to the best of my knowledge. If you begin to believe what I am saying is not the truth, then I encourage you to quit reading this and spend your time more productively by truly seeking the presence of God in your life.

        Millions of people have heart attacks every year. What makes mine so special or different? Maybe it was the circumstances. One thing is that only by the grace of God, did I have the wisdom to ask the people at the business where my situation occurred to call an ambulance for me, because more than once in my life I had shrugged things off physically till I literally woke up in a hospital.

       Initially, I had broken out in a cold sweat.  That happens to people who have hypoglycemic attacks because they do not eat properly. Your sugar levels get all out of whack.  Driving a truck and eating regular meals sometimes is not easy to do. Often you are not near a place to get something, and you wind up spending longer than you intend waiting to get loaded or unloaded. However, that morning I had eaten a normal meal. Thinking it was still just an imbalance issue, I went to the cab of my truck and got a swig of pop and some soda crackers which usually worked.

         Upon returning to the inside of my trailer, it quickly became apparent something else was wrong, as I could not get my breath.  I mean, I could breathe, but it was like I was not getting any oxygen.  Finally, things started into a slow spin, and the urge to go to the bathroom became overwhelming. With much effort, somehow I managed to get the couple of hundred feet to the office and asked the people there to call me an ambulance. It was a just a matter of minutes till the ambulance arrived.  The ambulance was on the way back to the hospital from a previous run and was only a couple of blocks away when they got the call. Much of this I found out after the fact.

        One of the things I do remember is how nice the ambulance crew was upon their arrival.  Getting on the cart was the last thing I remembered till a doctor at the hospital asked me to sign a paper and told me he was performing a procedure to help me, because I was having a heart attack. If I signed the paper, I do not remember.  The next memory I had was the doctor standing over me with the stethoscope.

        Coincidence number two was that I had only been about a mile and a half from Saint Agnes hospital in Baltimore. If you are going to have a heart attack, that is a good place to be.  The reason is that Saint Agnes was the first hospital in America to come up with the idea of a specialized cardiac care facility.  They also have some of the top people in the field of cardiac care.

       The third thing that saved my life was that the actual cardiac arrest did not start till I was in the emergency room at the hospital. The doctor informed me that if I had not been where I was, when I was, we would not have been having our conversation. He said if the attack had started in the warehouse, they could not have gotten me to the hospital in time to save my life,  even with the short distance involved.

     Supposedly, the final thing that saved my life was that, during the emergency, they had to hit me with the defibrillator paddles. They lost me twice.  As I understand it, the first time they brought me back with a single hit.  However, the second time they hit me twice, and I did not come back.  They thought I was gone; and someone said “Third time is a charm,” and they hit me again.  Fortunately, it worked.  The burn marks from the paddles were one of the worst side effects of the whole ordeal.  However, if you consider the alternative, it was not that big of a deal.

       Several days later, my family and I left Baltimore and flew into Louisville, Kentucky on our way home.  This small part of my life came full circle to me as I looked down at the C-130 airplanes on the tarmac at the airport. The C-130 had been central to several of the main events in my life.  It was almost as if I heard an audible voice say to me “You have had your time; now it is my time.”  God had given me fifty-seven years of life, and now He was calling a promise I had made due.

         Why me; why now; why at all?  God does not have to answer to anyone, especially a man who has run from Him most of his life  He has spoke through the mouth of a donkey. That is in Numbers 22.  He has used people who were the epitome of evil to get “His will” done.  Also, just as I know, I could die before I get this done; God will get His message out with or without me.  It is vanity and pride to think God needs us to do anything.  However, I believe the things I have come to understand and see speak to this day and age in a special way and with a special purpose. Yet, God’s Word has always been special.  Soon and very soon, mankind will come to a very vivid understanding of that.

      Yes, I believe we are in the end time.  The next part of my testimony will test your ability to accept things as they are. Some will discard what I have to say quickly and say God does not speak to people anymore. That is their privilege.  However, when I read the Bible, I find that Jesus marveled at two things while He was here on earth.  He marveled at total blind, unquestioning faith, and He marveled at unbelief.
 
     First, I would like to say something about unbelief, because I think it is the most deadly thing that can happen to someone. When someone rationalizes why they do not believe something or why God cannot do something, they are treading on very, very thin ice, as far as I am concerned. Yes, there are some things God cannot do. Before you write me off as nuts, at least read the next paragraph and see if you do not agree with me. Only a faithful person will agree.

     First, God cannot lie. If God says it, that makes it truth. Second, God cannot steal, as everything in the whole universe belongs to Him to start with.  Thirdly, and finally, God cannot cheat, because He is the One who makes the rules to start with. So there are three things God cannot do.  That may be playing with words, but it is the truth as far as I see it.

     That is as good of a place to start in my estimation as any. When asked what truth was, Jesus replied, in John 8:32  “I am the way, the truth and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.”  If one comes to understand that Jesus was God’s Word made flesh, then you also know that without knowing Him, God’s Word, you cannot know God.  John 17:17 makes it clear we are “sanctified through the truth, and His Word is truth.” To many, that may sound adversarial, but if you are seeking God and if you hope to find Him, it will be on His terms.   If you are not willing to meet Him on His terms, you are suffering from vanity and pride. Those are two of the things He hates most so your chances of success are slim unless you discover a little humility along the way.  You do not even have to ask to get a big dose of humility.  It is one of the reality sticks with which he opens blind eyes.

    All that being, said I must admit, yes, I have lied and occasionally still do.  However, nowadays, it is more from senility than intent. The testimony I am about to give though is the truth.  It is still as fresh in my mind as the moment it happened. Reflecting on my past, I would say one of my biggest problems was that I was a “the grass is always greener” person.  The only good places in life were where I had been and where I was going. It took me many years to get over that.  Once you learn to be happy with where you are, God will open the gate and put you where He wants you to be. However, it will be on His timetable, not ours.
   

It Rains On The Good and The Bad

                 It Rains On The Good and The Bad

All the years I drove my own truck over the road the verse from Proverbs 3:5-6 was painted on the sides of my hood. The verse says, “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he shall direct your path.” The Good Lord opened the doors and paved the way for me to be in my own truck and I wanted people to know where my blessings come from. Believing it has made me come to understand sometimes the things he has to say to us are things we do not want to hear. Another verse made me understand that the truth will in fact set us free. If we believe in God he orders our paths and brings all things to pass for our good.  Sort of like when he can pick five torn souls at a writer’s conference of several hundred people. Bring them together from different parts of the country. Set them down at one table so they can encourage each other that there is hope. Making us see that even in our time of suffering and dealing with things we do not understand, he is with us. Of the five of us at the table four had recently lost a loved one. The fifth was dealing with fear of losing a loved one. I may be wrong but I see that as God being at work in our presence. Coincidence? I think not.  Read my next post or go to my blog of 3/29/12 which is the second part of my book Further Down the Path, which I posted free in seven parts and scroll down to the Testimony and you will see why I do not believe in accidents.

Tuesday morning 9/11/2001 dawned a beautiful and clear day. I found myself unloading in Bayonne, NJ. I had just delivered a load of spices from Reno, NV. As the load bought me through my home I took a day off en route.  Usually I delivered on Mondays but the day off at home put me in Bayonne on Tuesday.  I finished unloading at 07:30 and took a couple minutes to do my paperwork. As I left and moved to the north bound waterfront road I noticed people all staring, and some pointing east. As I looked across the river I could see smoke pouring from the top of one of the World Trade Center buildings. I pulled over for a few minutes and watched.  I was not sure what I was watching but I could tell it was intense. I turned on my radio and picked up a local station. The radio announcer was in the other tower. He was excited and describing the chaos. He stated that people had been advised to evacuate his building and that a plane had flown into the other tower.  He also stated he was staying on the radio and reporting. As I started hearing local sirens I decided where I was sitting I might be in the way of traffic. The best thing for me to do was quit rubber necking(a term for people who try to see the gore in an accident) and get out of the area. On my way to the truck stop in Bloomsbury, NJ my radio suddenly went dead. The next channel I found on the radio announced that another plane had hit the other tower. As I walked into the truck stop the area around the TV sales point was packed with people. I arrived just in time to see the first building go down. What I did not realize until sometime later that it was the second one hit that went down first. Suddenly I realized why my radio went dead. The disc jockey paid the ultimate price to share what he knew. We all need to learn to share. We also need to learn to listen. Certainly he had no clue as the events unfolding and the price of his decision. It is always important to share what we know and feel, because we are not promised tomorrow.  It is best to put it all in God's hands and follow what he puts in our hearts. Regardless of the outcome we need to know that his will is being done, even if we do not understand it at the time.

As horrible as 9/11 was there have been far more destructive manmade disasters. The atomic bombs in dropped on Japan killed a hundred times as many people in the manmade disasters of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in World War II.  In December of 2004 almost a hundred times as many would die in a Tsunami. Nature would not be outdone by man.  The tsunami would be followed shortly by Hurricane Katrina.  John Mutter a Columbia University professor estimates the loss of life from all cause in Hurricane Katrina to be around 3500 people.  Most of us are aware of the earthquake in Japan followed by a tsunami. Having seen the magnitude of that disaster on TV it amazes me so few were killed.

Why the focus on all this death and destruction? Some preachers I have heard actually proclaimed there were no Christians in the World Trade Centers. That is not what Jesus said. In Luke 13:1-5 he made it clear that it is not how you die, but your relationship to him when you die that is important. We are all going to die at some point in time.  Jesus spent his last night on earth warning his disciples of what the end of the world would be like. He said it would be as it was in the days of Noah.  He said that people would be eating, drinking and marrying. He left out what Genesis 6:3-5 said.  He could do that because those who truly know him, know His Word and what it says.  Those who truly know him will be able to discern the time they are in. We will not know the hour or the day.  However we will be able to tell it is the time. Looking around us at all the destruction and mankind killing mankind it certainly resembles the time of Noah.

So how do we get ourselves ready to meet our Lord and Savior.  We need to get in His Word and study to make ourselves approved and live our lives according to His Word.  God said in Hosea 4:6 “My people perish for a lack of knowledge.”  He did not say the unbelievers, or the sinners.  He said “My people” that means people that think they have a relationship with God. So how do we know if we truly have a relationship with God?  In First John 2:27 His Word makes it clear that we do not need any man to teach us how to follow him.  If we are truly in relationship with him we will be in His Word and he will teach us what we need to know.  If we are in right relationship with God how we perish is immaterial. Our destination is clearly defined, just as the destination for those who do not have a relationship is clearly defined.

As evil as all the above mentioned destruction is, God has a purpose in it.

                       

Isaiah Chapter 57:1

                 1The righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart: and merciful men are                         taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come.

Evil is on its way.

Driving on Prayer

                               Driving on a prayer

    This post is an excerpt from a book on my career as a truck driver. It happened shortly after I got my own truck and stepped out in faith.  It had to be on faith, because I took the last $1500 dollars out of my checking account to make the down payment on my twenty-three year old truck. The only money I had when I started was the advance from my first load and that is how I survived till I retired. Looking back it was an awesome trip. 

      Everything went fine for about six months and then my first crisis hit.  The load I was picking up was in Salina, Kansas going to Mountain Top, Pennsylvania.  Yes that is the real name of the town.  While deadheading to Salina from Colorado I noticed a loud growling coming from the rear of the truck. I got to Salina and dropped and hooked trailers.  Before leaving Salina I decided it was time to take Bertha to the doctor.  His diagnosis was severe.  The rear ends were about to go out.  It would cost $3400.00 to fix them right.  It was far more than I had. My company had a policy they did not give loans till you had been with the company a year.  Even if I could get them to advance me the money I had already earned it would not be enough.

     Not having that kind of money and no way to get it, we would just have to see how far we got.  Bertha made it to my home okay but the low growl in Kansas was a roar by Indiana.  Fortunately the load was very light and pulled easy.  After the week end I had about six hundred miles to go.  It went okay till a place called Lamar, Pennsylvania.  Stopping to eat and spend my time in the Word I picked up a local copy of the truck trader a newspaper add caught my eye.  It was for a company that specialized in repairing rear ends.  In one corner of the ad was a little Christian fish logo.    

       Upon calling the company they told me if I could make the twenty miles up to their shop they would check it out and could get to me the coming morning.  On my way there Bertha gave me the scare of my life.  It was a very long hill up to their shop.  A band blew off my turbo. It sounded like the engine was blowing up. It still ran though it pulled very weakly.  We made it to the shop about three in the afternoon and the manager did the inspection.  He said they would start in the morning and have me out by noon.  When I asked how much it would be I explained my financial situation.  He said don’t worry about it.  He told me to get a good night’s sleep and pray about it. H said he would see me at seven in the morning.

      Next morning he knocked on my door and opened the hood.  He fixed the strap on my turbo and backed me into the shop.  In an hour and a half they had it apart. True to his word by noon they had the whole thing rebuilt and ready to roll. Then he gave me the bill for $1500.  That was almost two thousand dollars cheaper than Kansas.

     Again I called my company not really expecting much help.  With the pay I had coming I was only a few hundred dollars short. So I asked about the loan again.  She asked how long I had had my truck on with the company and I said six months.

      

       She replied by asking me how long I had driven for the company and I replied about a year. She informed me that Saturday I had gone over the one year mark.  They based it on time with the company not time in my truck.  They lent me all the money.  They took it back at one hundred fifty dollars a week.  When I told the manager he laughed and said, “That was a good prayer, you can’t beat God.”  He was right about that.

      After that experience I never worried about how things would work out.  When God has his hands on the wheel you can’t go wrong.  It says the steps of the righteous are ordered of the Lord.  It also says all things work together for good to them that believe on his Word.  That is our part we have to believe.  We also need to ask for help and guidance. In Joshua 1: 8 KJV it makes clear that those who follow God’s Word will be blessed, but it also says we must make the effort.  We do not just sit back and wait on things to happen.

      David did not wait for God to take care of Goliath.  He rose to the occasion and picked up five stones and went out to meet Goliath.  Goliath did not lose because he could not whip David.  He lost because he was over confident and self-centered.  He did not assess the power of what a slingshot was capable of in a skilled set of hands. God did not leave David hanging either.  David picked up five stones. It tells later that Goliath had four brothers. In my life time I have seen the bigger guy get trashed over and over.  Also I have seen the little guy win against all odds. It reminds me of the old saying, “It is not the size of the dog in the fight that matters, it is the size of the fight in the dog” Probably one of the truest proverbs ever written.

     Learning to trust God does not happen suddenly.  Our trust grows as we learn to know what God can do.  David had his path prepared by dealing with wild animals that were every bit as deadly as his adversary Goliath. The thing that counted was he knew God would give him the victory.  There was no doubt in his mind.

If You Have CDL, A Ticket Or Legal Issue Pending, In Another State, You Might Want To Read This

          Is your license in jeopardy? It could be and many of us would never realize it. The Federal laws have changed and states you do not even live in can now suspend your license. I discovered it totally by accident.  No pun intended.  When I went to the Indiana license branch to renew my license in December I was told my license had been suspended by the state of Massachusetts.  When I inquired as to what or why they informed me it was related to an incident from October of 2002.  This totally dumbfounded me as I thought the issue was settled long ago.

        It took me from December till May to get it all straightened out.  It was done with no help from Indiana or Massachusetts.  After many frustrating calls to both states I called the attorney of the company who had sued me and he, I meant she, the legal assistant of the attorney, got the matter straightened out.  If Lisa had not been so conscientious about her job I might still be walking.

      Here is how it happened.  In October 2002 I was delivering a load in the Boston area.  I had to make a left turn into my customers receiving area.  Because traffic was backed up I could not complete the turn.  A motorist going in the opposite direction decided to back up and let a person out of a parking space to his right front. He evidently did not see my trailer sitting crossways behind him. In the process he backed into the side of my trailer. Irony of it was he worked where I was delivering.  Anyhow we exchanged information and then he left the scene of the accident.  It did no damage at all to my truck.  Having taken pictures and exchanged information I thought I was covered and never called the police.

     Lesson learned by me was, no matter how minor the accident, call the police and get a report to protect yourself.  The gentleman who backed into me went to his insurance company and filed a claim.  Well they sued me to reclaim the $760+ dollars in damages to repair to his car.  I did not get this notice until May of 2004.  In January of 2004 I had a heart attack and was no longer driving. I had turned in my CDL in April or May. I wrote the State of Massachusetts explaining why I could not come to Massachusetts.  I later received a letter from the small claims court saying they had judged against me and I would be liable for damages plus interest. They also threatened to suspend my license.  I immediately sat down and wrote a letter explaining what happened and sent pictures to back up what I was saying.  I never heard anymore on the matter.  In December of 2006 I renewed my license in Indiana and had no problem.  At least I thought so.

       It seems the law changed, or gone into effect, between 2006 and 2012 and states can now suspend the license of another state.  Once that happens you are at the mercy of the system in getting it straightened out.  Had I not kept a copy of the small claim judgment I would not have had the name of the attorney of the company who sued me. In frustration after hours of sitting on the phone calling state numbers which no one ever answered I tried the attorney’s number. I figured with interest the cost would now be close to $1500.  After discussing the matter they decided if I would send half of the original $760 they would release the judgment.  I sent the money, but the nightmare was not over. I received a notification that until I paid a $100 reinstatement fee they would not release my license.  Being kind of over a barrel I sent the money. A few weeks later I got a letter reinstating my license.

     In the course of the discussions I had with Indiana, Massachusetts, the attorney, Lisa the legal assistant and several others I learned several things.  I definitely was not the only victim and it was happening pretty often. Any judgment for money, any unpaid ticket and any unsettled legal action can cause you to lose your license.  The state you committed the offence in can legally suspend your license under federal law.  I personally feel that somehow violates the Constitution, but if you want your license back you will settle the issue.  The lady on the Massachusetts help desk, while sympathetic, stated the law is the law and she had to enforce it as it was written.  Indiana told me that once an action is taken and a license is suspended under the federal law they have no authority to over ride or issue you a license. The irony of it to me is that there was no ticket or driving related charge.  It was strictly over the amount of the judgment not being paid.  Because I did not physically appear in court the judgment was decided in favor of the insurance company.

        If you are traveling and get a ticket and decide you can blow it off because it is not in your home state you better think again. They can make your life absolutely miserable and believe me you do not want to deal with any state bureaucracy.  Also beings you will have a suspension on your record you can be forced to pay high risk insurance for up to five years. If for no other reason, that is a good reason to get the matter settled and move on with your life.

Building a Hedge of God's Protection Around Yourself

       In the spring of 1982 I felt like I was getting ready to take on the world.  I had just finished my time at Vincennes University (VU).  Having left the Army after thirteen years in the October of 1978 I started my adventure at VU January 1979.  I finished with an AS in Business Management, an AS in Recreation and Leisure Services and quite a few classes in Commercial Art.  Being in my thirties I was much older than most of my classmates. Not bad for a high school dropout with a GED.

      Surviving school was and adventure.  I worked nightshift full time as a bartender at the local American Legion.  Days when not in classes I did yard work and landscaping. I bought ten new canoes thru the local boat dealer.  My fellow students had time to go on canoe trips over the weekends.  I dropped them off and picked them up when they were done.  It was not making me rich, but it helped make ends meet.  Having a family of six my obligations did not allow me the carefree college life of my fellow students.

       My goal had been to start a company making playground furniture out of timbers.  It got sidetracked by the reality of life.  I expanded my landscaping and started a mobile home repair business. Stumbled into residential tree trimming which paid well. I had the equipment and my partner had the talent to climb and cut.  He convinced me to quit my bartending job so we could go full time.  The next month he got called back to his union job and left me hanging. I expanded into building custom decks, which fit with the landscaping and mowing.  One problem I had was that all my businesses were seasonal or summer work.  I cut firewood and basically did whatever I could to survive each winter.

       In spite of all the hassle of trying to survive I felt truly blessed. In the spring of 1983 I was mowing a yard and the thought crossed my mind I should be giving some of my money to the church. I did not attend one at that time. As I picked up the paper before mowing I found an unsealed and open envelope with a stamp on it addressed to Oral Roberts.  I never cared for Oral Roberts, though my Mom did.  Feeling that it was a sign I started sending Oral Roberts money.  That lasted till I started getting calls at my home asking for more money than I had sent. Later sharing that story someone said it was probably just a coincidence and that someone had probably stole the original money.  That thought had never crossed my mind. If that was the case who was the blessed person, Oral Roberts or the person who’s money I replaced. Over the years I have found I am just as capable as the church at finding people in need and helping them.  If I do it more of the money gets to those with needs.  The church still needs help though. The problem I have with most churches is their focus on building programs. Yes we are to build the church, but it is a church of people, not stones and mortar.  When you look at all the money being spent on TV ministries, many with their feel good, get rich messages are leading people astray.  Read the 13^th Chapter of Ezekiel and you will see what God thinks of false ministries.

       My ministry out on the road was simple.  When going into the truck stop to eat I would look for the person sitting on their bags.  Or for one who looked lost, or down and out.   There never seemed to be a shortage of them.  I would invite them to eat with me and that gave me a chance to find out their story.  I would always pay for the meal.  If I was moved or felt they had a legitimate need I would give them more than enough to pay for the meal and tell them to keep the change.  It was not much but it helped.  Lacking that kind of person to help I would look around the restaurant. If I saw a large family with well-behaved kids I would have the waitress bring me their bill and I would pay it.  It may not have been the perfect ministry but at least I was doing something.

       Getting back on track, things boomed for me the next few years.  It went well till my wife talked me into going to a family cookout.  I had grown to the point I needed part time help for a lot of the work I was doing.  At the cookout was a group of bikers. They had a club house and there was always someone who needed some money to either fix their bike or party.  I did not care which the case was.  I paid by the job and they got the same money if we worked two hours or five hours.  They were motivated, smart and hard workers.  The problem was I started hanging with them.  Work slowly became secondary.  The road to the bottom was starting down a long hill.

       It ended at the absolute bottom.  After spending six months living in a van in Fort Meyers, FL I came home and turned my van into the bank. I had caught up my bills while I was in Florida.  One bank had sued me and the court sent me a letter to be in court or be held in contempt.  So I quit my job and came back to Indiana.  Where I had no job and no prospect of getting one. 

        When I reached that low I was sitting on the bank of the Wabash River at a local park and made my peace with God.  I told him I had nothing but my time.  I restarted my life by giving ten percent of my time to studying His Word.  In less than three years I had recovered all I had lost and was starting over.  I went door to door looking for work. It led to a job as a warehouse worker for a local moving company.  From that I moved into trucking which is what I did until I retired.  I learned to drive a truck while I was running from God and in Vietnam. 

      This post basically covers the transitional years from when I left the Army till I started truck driving for a living.  It fills in a gap in my book and gives the basics of how I got from one part of my life to the next.  It had been my intent to drive a truck when I left the service.  I took a terminal leave and worked for a guy for sixty days for basically free to show I could do the job.  When my discharge was final his boss would not let him hire me because of my lack of civilian experience.  Later in time that experience would benefit me more than once. The guy who had given me the chance finally had his own company and he recommended me to one of his truck owners as a driver.  That job opened the door later in my career by giving me experience pulling a refrigerated unit. I was disappointed when I got out of the service and it did not work out to drive, it all did work for the good in the long run. God is always tending to the hedge around our lives.  Our walk with him determines how he trims it. It can be a hedge of protection, or a hedge of correction. If you look at my last post and read the scriptures listed at the end concerning hedges you will learn a lot about how God works in our lives. It is only nine verses or chapters.  If you read it with the desire to get understanding it will open your eyes. There is a verse in the Bible that says we reap what we sow. If you look back over your life you will see that what you have planted or given out is exactly what you have harvested.  If you have just come to know the Lord, start praying for crop failure on any bad seed.  Then pray it is not to late.

         It was not the first time, nor the last time.  God has often used experiences from my past to open doors in my life.  He has also kept doors closed in my life till he knew I was prepared to go through them.  In the Bible it says the steps of the righteous are ordered of the Lord and all things work together for good to them that believe.   Sometimes we will not even know it is happening.  At least not till we look back over a long period of time and see the whole thing in a different perspective.  The farther I walk along the path of life the more times I can see that what I sometimes thought were bad things actually worked in my favor.  As the country song says, “Thank God for unanswered prayers.”  He knows what is best for us and what we have need of.

       A lot of things happened in this short seven year period of my life.  Looking back I can see that my life was being rearranged to my benefit.  Many of my future experiences would be influenced by the events happening during this time period and leading up to it.  Even my last year in the Army when I was assigned to write stories for the command newspaper in Panama would play out and open doors for me.  It is opening writing doors because I can honestly say I have experience writing for a newspaper.  The experiences themselves are providing substance for stories.  Hopefully the stories I write are not just about me and my experiences, but examples that will help others to avoid some of the pitfalls I experienced and was lucky enough to walk away from.

Building A Hedge Of God's Protection

      Surviving in the world today is a hard thing to do.  Especially when you have no job, mouths to feed and the need to provide shelter. As the old saying goes been there and done that. It is purely by the Grace of God that I am here today.  God provides a hedge of protection that protects us from the evil in this world. Left to my own devices I would have starved to death.  At one point in my life I had my own business and was making what I thought was good money.  The problem was I lost sight of the source of my blessing. I had to get as low as I could go before I realized that I had turned away from the source of my blessing.  I had lost my business, my house, my car and my family.  In retrospect there was no need to have lost any of it.  The reason I did lose it all was by feeling that “I” was doing it all.  I was the master of my destiny and that I could do it on my own.  Looking back it is easy to see dozens of ways it could have been avoided, but God was letting me “do my own thing.”

       In reality I knew where my blessings were coming from. It was a willful choice to turn away from God.  It was not that I intentionally turned my back on God.  It got to the point I started taking for granted the blessings I was receiving. Slowly I stopped tithing, I stopped looking for God in the things happening in my life and worst of all I quit giving even verbal thanks to him. God simply removed his hedge of protection and let me see how well I could do on my own.  Having reached a point where I had virtually nothing and the only way I could look was up. I did.  I told God I understood the error of my ways.  I had nothing.  I promised to tithe 10% of my time to the Lord as it was all I had to give.  The next several years I spent at least two and one half hours a day in the Bible.  It was easy when I was unemployed, but it became a challenge when I had a job. It was a period that changed my life.  In less than three years I had my family back and had recovered all my losses and then some.  God is good to His Word.  My desire now is to return to spending that time with the Lord.  Notice there are a whole lot of I's in these first paragraphs.

        In the course of studying God’s Word many things became clear to me..  One is that God does work the same yesterday, today and forever just as His Word says.  He does provide a hedge of protection for us.  Just as Jesus said, “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”  While that verse is in Matthew, Jesus was quoting it from Deuteronomy 8:3.  If you study the Bible you will find it says, “5Every word of God is pure: he is a shield unto them that put their trust in him.” Proverbs 30:5  At that point a shield.would have been handy. The Bible gives us many stories as examples of how and how not to live our lives.                

        Hedges are mentioned several times in the Bible. The first is in Job 1:10.  God is having a conversation with Satan.  Satan wants to harm Job but he can’t because God protects Job.  In the course of the Book of Job we get to see what happens to a person when God removes his protection.  At the end of this post there is a list of verses that show what and how a hedge works. How it works is determined by our walk with the Lord.  In Hosea 4:6 it says, “My people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge; because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will reject thee.”  Notice it says my people.  It does not say sinners or heathens.

       God does not wish that any should perish. II Chronicles 16:9 makes that clear.  It says, “The eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth, to show himself strong in the behalf of them whose heart is perfect toward him.  He makes it clear in Ezekiel 33:11 that he does not desire that the wicked die, but that they turn from their evil.  He also makes it clear in the next couple verses that trusting in your own righteousness will not save you if you sin.  It is cut and dried and as they would say in this day and age.  It is either God’s way or the highway.  He does not play let’s make a deal.

       Three verses in the Bible changed my life. The first was Luke 6:46 “Why call ye me, Lord, Lord, and do not the things I say.  That means I have to do what he said to do.  He told his Father to forgive those crucifying him.  In Matthew 6:14 he makes it clear the same is required of us.  The last commandment he gave as far as I can tell was in 1^st Corinthians 11:23-30 that we partake of the body and the blood of Christ every time we come together in remembrance of him and what he did.  Will taking communion get me into heaven?  No I do not think so, but I do think it shows I am seeking to follow His Word as he proclaimed it.  Very few churches besides the Catholic Church; the Church of Christ which has two kinds, instrumental and non- instrumental and the Christian Churches actually do so.

        In Haggai 1:6 we are told, “You have sown much, and bring in little; ye eat, but ye have not enough; ye drink, but ye are not filled with drink; ye clothe yourselves, but there is none warm; and he that earneth wages earneth wages to put it in a bag with holes. 7. Thus saith the Lord of host: Consider your ways.”  This was God’s judgment for failing to follow him and His Word.  God offered them a solution in Malachi 3:10-12,  10“ Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house, and test me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open the windows of heaven, and pour out for you a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it. 11. And I will rebuke the devourer for your sakes, and he shall not destroy the fruit of your ground; neither shall your vine cast its fruit before the time in the field, saith the Lord of hosts 12. And all nations shall call you blessed. That is a pretty awesome challenge.

        America may have had a Malachi blessing, but we are definitely turning towards a Haggai curse. The 28^th Chapter of Deuteronomy gives the blessings and curses that befall a nation that follows God and one that turns its back on God.  The first fourteen verses describe the blessings.  The remaining fifty-four verses describe the curses that befall a nation that turns its back on God.  Read it and make up your own mind where America is headed as a nation.

         Hopefully you will read the verses that I put at the end of this post.  You will see why you want to have a relation with God.  Especially one in which he puts a hedge of protection around you and your family.  If you feel you are walking with God may you be encouraged to look at the hedge you presently have.  Is it growing or dying.  I challenge you to spend some time in the study of God’s Word.  Especially if you feel you are coming up short in life and see if it does not fill the void.  All the blessings may not be financial, some may be doors opening and protection for loved ones.  You will see the difference if you just open your eyes and look for it.  

Verses dealing with Hedges 

Job 1:10         

Prov 15:19

Ec 10:8

Isa 5:5
Eze 13:5 Warning against following false prophets

Eze 22:30 Warns that there was no one to stand in the gap.

Ho 2:6

Mic 7:4

Mk 12:1