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Ordinary people who have been transformed by an extraordinary God tell their stories of what happened and what their lives are like now.
CAILIN: Welcome everyone to
Faith and Purpose podcast.
Each episode of this podcast contains the
personal testimony of an ordinary person
transformed by an extraordinary God.
My name is Caitlin and I'm
here to introduce this podcast
for my friend Jesse Duke.
Jesse is a husband, father, author,
life recovery guide, lay counselor,
and small group leader, but his
most important role is disciple.
As a disciple of Jesus.
Jesse created this podcast to help other
believers tell their faith stories.
We'll be hearing the personal
testimonies of all sorts of people
who have one thing in common,
Jesus has transformed their lives.
Jesus used parables because he created
us to learn best through story.
And as we listen to how God has worked
in others lives, we find encouragement
and inspiration for our own faith walk.
Whether you are already a believer, or
just a curious seeker, we believe that
as you listen to these stories, you will
be encouraged on your own faith journey.
We are sure that God can speak to you
through one of these episodes, and that
you will see that our Heavenly Father
truly works all things together for
our good, When we simply love and trust
him if you are currently going through
a trial We believe that you will come
to see that your troubles Heartbreaks
and failures are not gravestones, but
stepping stones into new life in Christ.
Here's Jesse with today's guest
Jesse: Welcome everybody to
faith and purpose podcast.
I'm Jesse Duke.
And today we have my longtime friend,
Jamie Renfro to tell his faith story.
Jamie's a former green beret, a lawyer,
an entrepreneur, and a lot more, but best
of all, he's a great husband and father.
Welcome Jeremy.
I've known you for over four decades
now, and I've never heard your story.
Of course I've got bits and pieces.
But, uh, so tell us your story
as if I don't know a thing.
However, the Lord leads you.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
Well, I've been a
Christian for a long time.
I was born in a little town
in South Carolina, Lakeview,
which is in Dillon County, close
to the North Carolina border.
I'm going to give you,
perspective on where I grew up.
Very small town.
And, my, my mother was a Christian, my
grandmother was a Christian, and they
made sure we were in church on Sunday.
My dad and my granddad, neither
one were Christians at that time.
but that's how I grew up until I was
15, in, in that kind of a household.
my dad, when I was very
young, was my hero.
he played semi pro baseball.
I go to his games.
Catch balls when they got fouled
off and that kind of thing and then
he got into dirt track racing and
so I go to dirt track and watch
him race and be a part of that.
And as a very young boy, my dad was.
The hero that most of us boys would like
to have, and, I wanted to be just like
him, I wanted to do things like him,
and all of that, my parents got married
very young, and we have a very large
family, I was the second child, the
oldest boy, and, a family of 11 kids,
My dad and mom neither had high school
education, and so I'd say the biggest
stress for them at that time was financial
pressure, raising a large family.
And of course, there weren't 11 kids
at that when I was young, but, still a
large family and, my youngest sister was
born the year I went to college, and my
two youngest brothers were born after
I went to the college, we still had
a large family when I was growing up.
Finances were really tough.
And my dad always worked, but, some
of the guys he got hanging around
with, they had a, an influence
on him, and, he allowed that.
It wasn't their fault.
it was his decision to start drinking
alcohol, and, when he played baseball, he
never did any of alcohol or drugs because
he needed to be in good conditioning.
physical condition to play baseball.
But when he started
racing, that changed a lot.
And, I remember, after a few years of
that, I remember him coming home at night
drunk and raising Cain and just, things
really took a dark turn in our family
over the next few years, because of the
things that were happening in his life.
Now, during that time, when I
was nine, I became a Christian.
But it was through the influence
of my mother and grandmother
who always had us in church and,
they taught us, all about Jesus.
And I was in church service last night
and we were singing some of the old hymns
and tears came to my eyes as I thought
about, my mom and grandmom were the
ones who I first heard singing these.
Hymns and, taught me the hymns
and, took me to church to, to
hear all these Christmas hymns.
And, so my early life, I really owe the,
my, my becoming a Christian and learning
about Christ to my mom and grandmother who
were a really large influence in my life.
But like most boys Uh, as we
get older, our moms and our
grandmamas can't tell us too much.
We look more to our dads and, they
have a lot more influence in my life.
And so after I became a Christian, I
started down that road of following
in my dad's footsteps and becoming
the person that he was at that time.
Although I hated a lot of the things
that I saw as a child, for some reason,
boys follow in their dad's footsteps
and, so a lot of the things that he was
doing, the foul language, the fighting,
all those kinds of things that he was
involved in, I was following right behind.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Okay.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
things changed when I was 15, um, my
sister and I rotated, nights, spending the
night with my grandmother who lived out in
the country, one of my grandmothers that
lived out in the country, my dad's mom,
her husband had died years ago and years
before, and So we took turns spending
that with her, keeping her company.
And one night or one morning when I
got up, I got a call from my mother
that said, don't go to school today.
Somebody will come pick you up.
And when I got home, when I was Picked up
by my grand grandmother and brought home.
there had been a big altercation at
home and, my dad ended up in jail
and, my parents split up and we lived
across the street from mom and dad.
And, after A few weeks of that, my, my
granddad and my mom worked together and
he bought a mobile home and, we moved this
mobile home on to his property and we all
moved into the mobile home on his property
and that's where we lived for the next
few months and, One thing I like to tell
people because I want people to understand
how Christ really changes people
and changes lives, and how sometimes
things that look really bad in your
life, God uses them to bring blessing.
But one day I was, on my bicycle
downtown and while my parents were
separated and my dad drove by.
I saw him throw up his hand to wave
at me, and I turned my back because
I didn't want anything to do with
him because of the things he had
done in our family and to my mom.
a few years earlier, he was my hero, and
now I didn't want anything to do with
him, and it's because of things that had
happened and transpired over those years.
But fortunately, dad had some friends
who, really took an interest in his life.
some men who had become Christians,
some men that he had known playing
baseball, who he had known racing,
who had become Christians, and
so they invited him to church.
And I heard Dad say sometime later
that he tried everything to straighten
his life out, and nothing worked
until he gave his life to Christ.
And so when I was 15 years old,
he gave his life to Christ.
He got involved in church.
He came back to mom and said, I
know I've really messed things up.
I'd like to try again.
I've given my life to Jesus.
And, I want to be the father and
the husband that you deserve.
And if you'll take me back,
then I'd like to start over.
And, I was the oldest boy.
Mom came to me after that.
She said, Jamie, what do you think?
Dad wants to come home.
And I said, Mom, please don't ask me that.
you're going to have
to make that decision.
That's something I cannot tell you.
And, but she allowed him to come back.
we moved the mobile home down
to his farm, started over.
his mother had a small farm out in
the country and we moved down there.
And, we started over and
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
how many people were in this
mobile home at that time?
Okay.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
so at that time there were seven and,
seven children and I had, like I said
earlier, I had a sister who was born,
which would have been number, she
would have been number nine, So there
were eight of us and then mom and dad.
So it'd been 10.
It was a four bedroom mobile home.
the girls had two rooms.
And the boys had one big room
with, bigger room with a couple
of bunks in there, that's how
we lived and, we got very close.
What was neat, though, is every
night Daddy would come home.
We started doing a Bible study at home.
He was home every day.
We worked together to clean up the
land around the mobile home and,
started doing things together.
He started going to, ball games,
played high school athletics,
and he started being at all the
games, most of the practices.
became much more involved in our lives
than he had been for the previous years.
And, things started really
to change a year or so later.
Older sister went off to college,
then my counselor at school suggested
I apply to West Point, and I did and
got accepted, and then my brother
that was a couple years younger did
the same, and so God really started
working at our home and in our life.
and for me, the dramatic thing was
seeing my dad before Christ and seeing
my dad and our family after Christ
and how things change so dramatically.
and I've heard this statistic.
I don't know how true it is, but
I think I'm an example of it.
And that is, if.
A mother comes to know Christ, and
there's a pretty high percentage
that the children will follow, um,
if the father in the family comes to
know Christ, then that number becomes
unbelievably high, like 80 or 90 percent,
when the father becomes, comes Christ.
David became the leader in our family.
Her home, took us to church, made sure
we were there, led our Bible studies and
all of that and became a godly father
and leader of our home after that.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
you had a living proof of God's
power right there in front of
you at all times after that.
So that was, I hear it in your, when
you're telling this, that, that was
a big influence on you just to see
how dramatically the change happened.
So you went off to West
Point after high school?
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
Yes.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
So what was that like?
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
came from a very small school.
and, I feel like God opened the door.
I applied for several
colleges, West Point.
And at that time, I'll consider Wheaton.
I thought that would be a great.
since I had really dedicated,
rededicated my life after my dad
became a Christian, I thought maybe
God was leading me in that direction.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1: by
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
don't recall that.
but I got accepted at West Point.
And with our financial, family financial
situation, that, that was a really
plus because of, everyone that goes to
the academies are on full scholarship.
that helped.
And, and it was academically,
it was very difficult for me,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
me.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
failed a course, there was no making
up, there was no summer school
because of other requirements,
military training and all.
if you didn't pass a course,
you didn't, you got kicked
out, you couldn't come back.
I taught mom and dad and they'd say, just
pray, God's got you there for a reason.
Do the best you can and have
faith that he'll help you
and he'll bring you through.
And by the end of that semester,
I was passing all my courses.
I never was a great college student.
I never had a, um, a great, GPA, but
God brought me through all of that.
And, and I think I was better prepared
from a physical standpoint, having
been involved in athletics and
also that side of the academy then.
Wasn't a struggle as much as
academically, but, I got through,
I always like to tell the story.
at West Point, you have the engineers
who were the top of the class, and then
the goats that are on the bottom of the
class, and then the lowest person in the
class is called the goat, and I didn't,
I wasn't the goat, but I could see the
whites of his eyes, so I was pretty close.
but I made it through.
God gave me the ability to get
called up and, and graduated.
So
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Alright, I'm curious and I know
somebody else is going to be too, but
where did that goat thing come from?
What's the
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
I have no idea.
That's just a tradition that's gone
on, because it um, the midshipman at
Annapolis are their mascots a goat.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Oh,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
And so the last person in the
class, is comparable to the smartest
guy at the NA Naval Academy.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Okay,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
so I guess that's where it came from.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Alright, well, so what next?
Silence.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
I'd seen my life.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1: It
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
finished my five year commitment.
For At Fort Bragg with 5th group.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
means you were a Green Beret.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
Correct.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Yeah, awesome So after your five
year commitment, what happened?
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
Got out of the army and I start,
praying, Lord, tell me, show
me what you want me to do next.
I'll stay in.
Make it a career, I'd get out, whatever,
and I felt um, at that time, at least,
that, maybe the Lord was leading me
to get out and do some other things.
I always had an interest in politics,
got out, ran for an office in the county
where I grew up in, in the probate judge.
And, ran for office, got a, Lord,
Lord, brought things together at
the right time, and I got elected as
probate judge, served a term there.
During that time, I got really
interested in getting more
education and going to law school.
Worked around a lot of judges,
a lot of lawyers, and I thought
that would be a good, thing to do.
And, at that time, I thought I
might be interested in staying
involved more in politics.
But if I did, I needed, a way to
make a living and I needed, uh,
better educate, more education.
So I went to law school and,
graduated three years later,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
something happened in law school
that I'd want to hear about.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
the best thing that happened at
law school is I met my wife, and,
she and I started, seeing each
other while we were in law school.
We didn't get married until,
a year after we graduated,
and again, it was a God thing.
I had fallen in love with a girl,
um, when I was in the Army, and,
I just knew that she was the one,
and so I, I was head over heels.
And, she didn't see it
that way, broke my heart.
when I was younger to make sure that
if I ever got married, that it would
be someone that God put into my life.
And it was his decision and not mine.
And, so I prayed, I met her,
we started dating, on and off.
I'm still praying, Lord, you got
to show me if she's the right one.
And through a series of events after
we graduated, I knew she was the one.
God really touched my heart
and I knew that I knew.
So I asked her to marry me and
we got married and been now been
married for Over 30 years, three,
three daughters from that marriage,
Jesse: Wow.
I'm sensing a pattern here.
After you, say, back in, high
school, you started praying.
You prayed about what college to go to,
and you applied to different colleges,
and you trusted God to lead you there, and
then, when it was time to get out of the
Army, you prayed and asked for direction
there, and, You went to, you did the,
probate judge thing and then you felt like
God was leading you to go to law school.
You did that.
you trusted God for your life mate and he
did that and I'm sensing a pattern here.
Keep going.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
I think I've had several young people
come to me over the last few years.
I think it's called an old,
older, and said, what do you
think's the secret to success?
And I think as a.
As a young man, I made a decision
as a person, I think we all have
to make a decision on what's
going to be our focus in life.
And I like to think about this in
terms of a military exercise that
I had back when I was in the army.
It's called land navigation.
In the civilian world,
it's called orienteering.
And in this exercise Um, you learn how
to read a compass, you use a compass and
a map, and you're given coordinates on
that map, and you mark it, and you mark
where you are, you draw a line to it, you
figure out how far from where you are to
where you're going, and you also, put your
compass down on that map and figure out
what direction you gotta go to get there.
And then, in the army we were given
a cord to tie to our belt and so when
you take off and you shoot your compass
in the direction you got to go and you
start walking, you start counting your
steps and every hundred steps or every
what you figure to be a hundred meters
in your walk, you tie a knot in it.
And, and you go to your target that works.
Okay.
Except there's a lot of obstacles
around the way along the way.
And sometimes you get to a lake or a.
River, and you got to go around it.
you can't just, you just can't shoot
your asthma across the river and swim it.
I guess you could, but what
you do is you do some call
resection and you take 90 degrees.
To go along the river and then you find
a place to cross and then you cross and
then you take 90 degrees back and but
it's a it's pretty tedious thing if you're
out in the woods and you're traveling
and you're trying to get find a little
stake, several miles away in the middle of
the woods, um, takes a lot of expertise.
It takes a lot of practicing and, all,
but it's totally dependent on what
you've learned and what you can do.
one day my ranger buddy and I were,
getting ready to start out and we
noticed that right above where this
end point was supposed to be, this
target was supposed to be, was a tower
sitting on the side of the mountain.
And we figured that if we could go to the
tower, it'd be easy to find that stake
just a short distance from the tower.
And so instead of.
of shooting our asthma,
counting our steps,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Document MS
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
and doing all those things,
we just went to the tower.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Word Document
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
And, we still had the same obstacles
across, but it was much easier
because we didn't have to count
steps, we didn't have to keep up with
directions, we just went to the tower.
And when we got to the tower, then we just
had a short distance to shoot an asthma
back to the target, and we got there,
and we got there much faster than if we
had done it our way, and much easier.
And so I think that's a
good analogy of how life is.
You can do it totally on your own.
You can take off.
You can have dreams.
you can do it by yourself and you hear
people a lot of times, successful people.
Oh, I'm a self made man.
I'm a self made man.
I don't think that's true, but that's
what a lot of people set out to do.
Or you can focus on Christ
and you can live for him.
And then all these other things.
Are going to take care of themselves.
You don't have to be right all the time.
You don't have to have everything
mapped out just perfectly.
Every time when those obstacles
come in your life, it's much
easier to deal with them.
If you're living for him, and I
think it's what with what it says in
Hebrews, after the author of Hebrews
lays out this hall of fame, what I
call a hall of faith of all these.
Great characters in the Bible
and what they had done what they
had accomplished through their
faith in Christ Then it says okay.
So what's the lesson here in Hebrews 12?
It says so what do we do and it says fix
your eyes on Christ And so just as we I
was fixing my eyes on that tower to get to
my target in life We have to fix our eyes
on Christ an interesting thing happened.
I learned Just a few months ago, I had
this in my mind about fixing your eyes
on Christ and living for Christ and
all these things to be taken care of.
And a good friend of mine,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Yeah.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
on the cross and Jesus off the cross.
And he said, no, he
said, you're missing it.
He said, what does John chapter one say?
And it says, um, that the word is Christ.
And he said, if you want to focus
on Christ, focus on the word.
And he quoted several other scriptures
about Jesus being the word and how that,
and how important that is in our life.
And so now when I think about focusing
on Christ, I'm in the word and I
think that's how we grow and how we
make it through life more abundantly.
if we want an abundant life, if we want
a successful life, then we focus on God,
we focus on Jesus, and we focus, and
we do that by staying in the word, and
that's hard to do sometimes, it's, we get
distracted in life, we get too busy, and
so we, we get out of the word, it's like
back to my land navigation, navigation.
example, sometimes you
can't see that tower.
So what do you have to do?
You don't want to just keep
going in the wrong direction.
So you have to refocus.
And the way you do that on land
navigation is you find high ground,
you either go to a mountaintop so
you can see the tower or you climb a
tree or some way so you can see that
tower to make sure you get back focus.
The same thing is true in life, I think.
And that is, You get off track sometimes,
you get, go through these dark valleys
sometimes where things just aren't
going well and most of the time in
my life, when that's happened, it's
because I've gotten out of the word,
I've gotten my eyes off of Christ and
got it into back into on to Jamie and
Jamie's what Jamie wants to do and what
Jamie thinks the right thing to do and
I fall back on my skills and my training
instead of Focusing first on Christ.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
that's the way.
yeah.
that's the way people, that's
the way the world operates,
We just do what feels right.
What seems right in our own eyes.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
Exactly.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
that's interesting.
I just want to say you I
like that land navigation.
analogy you gave.
I just, this last year I started
using a Bible reading plan.
I've never really been into those things
because I'm thinking, why should I focus
on getting through the Bible in a year?
I just want to be in the Word.
I want to, be led by the Holy Spirit.
I don't need this planned, And,
but I decided to go ahead and
give it a try and I started.
And, one of the things
that I've learned is
how relevant the word is to my
life even when I don't think it is.
in other words, like if I'm
on the, Ah, here's an example.
I was reading in, The Old Prophets.
I think I was in Zechariah.
About the time that, No, Ezekiel.
Oh, this, yeah, I was in Ezekiel about
the time this, whole thing over in Israel
started back on October 7th and all the
stuff that started happening around that.
And, man, that brought that Bible
to life, Everything that was
everything Ezekiel, God was saying
through Ezekiel just came to life
because I could see it in the world.
It was just happening.
It's happening right now.
And God's word is so relevant, even
though it was written thousands,
hundreds and thousands of years ago,
it's wow, it, that's just one example.
I don't have to be, necessarily
be reading, on topics that are
relevant to what I'm going through.
That's a self centered way to look at it.
But if I just focus on the word, then
somehow God weaves it into my life.
And another thing is that, I've
always heard that, the analogy of
a ship on the sea, if the ship's
sitting still, It can't go anywhere.
It has to be moving in order for it to
turn the rudder to make the ship move,
It's the analogy for me is I have to
be moving in God's direction and doing
something to connect with him so that he
can turn me the way he wants me to go.
So that's one, that's another value of
having a reading plan rather than my plan.
thank you for that, land
navigation analogy because that
made that come alive for me.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
the importance of reading the Bible
necessarily, but just reading.
And, he said, what you ought to do is,
Keep a book, and in this case the Bible,
right by your bedside, and develop a
habit of every night before you turn
off the light, is read a chapter or two.
And he said you'll be amazed how many
books over the course of the year
you'll read if you just read a chapter
every night before you go to sleep.
So I started that practice and it
was amazing, how many people In
this country read 12 books a year.
I found that most, if I read
one chapter a night in a book,
I can read a book a month.
That's about what it works out to.
Not many people read 12 books a year.
And if you put that in the Bible context,
if you do that, read a chapter every
night, then You can go through the Bible
pretty quickly, and then you do that
on top of, church and other things.
but it's very important that we
develop habits that are good.
It's easy to develop habits that are
bad, but it's hard to develop habits
that are good, and I think if we all
get in the habit of reading a chapter
a day in the Bible, at the very least.
then we can, as you say, while I go
about, keeping the ship on the right
course, I think it really helps a lot
when we develop those kind of good habits.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
I forgot where we were in your
story, sorry, I diverted there,
but let's see, where were we?
Oh, you talked about, you got married.
You had three girls, What was that
like raising three, three girls?
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
I think a lot of men, want boys,
want some boys mixed in there.
We want to have girls, but we want boys.
But the Lord saw to it
that I had three girls.
And, in retrospect, that was
probably the right thing.
I probably would have
been too tough on boys.
but, my wife was, or is the backbone
in our home as far as raising girls.
And, she's really good at it because she
likes to communicate, she talks with them
and they talk with her and, but we've kept
them in church while they were coming up.
We taught them, we, we tried to
duplicate what my mom and my grandmother,
and then later my dad, did for us.
And what her mom and her grandmother
did for her, we tried to teach them
and do for them what had been done for
us to pass that on, which I think as
a parent, that's our responsibility.
And when you're raising children,
not just girls, raising children,
you're always thinking about,
am I doing the right thing?
Am I doing, Am I too hard?
Am I too easy?
And all those things.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Yeah.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
time and then get all that experience
and then start over, it would be, it'd
be a lot easier the second time around.
But the first time you
just learning as you go.
I think the secret is
when you got to live.
An example for them.
You got to live what you teach them,
because if they see any hypocrisy in you,
they're not going to take it serious.
So they got to see it.
and then secondly, you got to,
as children, you control their
time and what they get involved
in and all those kind of things.
So you make sure that they're involved
in a good church, a good youth program.
And I know when, Carla and I, had,
after I had been practicing law for
a number of years, decided to move
up to Spartanburg, South Carolina,
which was a new city for us and all.
And so when we got there, we
were looking for a church.
And so we talked about
what we're looking for.
There was, there, actually, there
was a church that we really liked
um, as far as the teaching and all.
need to be where there's a great youth
program for our girls, and so we joined
that church with a great youth program.
Not that the teaching and the
preaching was bad or anything, it's
just, Youth program was so good.
We wanted our children
to be a part of that.
And I think that's really important.
But back to the hypocrisy thing, you can't
just send your kids to church and send
them to the youth program and outside of
church live a completely different life.
you gotta be the example
for them in how you live.
and we certainly are not perfect.
I'm not trying to say that, but,
they're going to do what you do.
And if it's bad, they're going to do
what you do times 3 or 4 or 5 or 10.
and if you do some good things, then
they're going to see that and learn
from that too, That's important.
Raising children.
Well, thank you for that.
You know, one thing I try to
remember to ask everybody is.
Have there been any spiritual
valleys that they've gone through?
Any times that you've doubted the Lord
or had challenges that you have struggled
with, that he brought you through,
that you would like to, to share.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
I think, as a young Christian, we
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
through
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
maybe we just hear that, if you.
pray that God will answer your prayers.
And I think as a young Christian,
oftentimes God, you pray and God
immediately answers your prayers and you
say, wow, this is, God's really wonderful.
I think as we start maturing as
Christians, a lot of times we
pray for things that we don't
get answers to right away.
And, I think, since I believe that
God answers all our prayers, then
there must be a reason why God doesn't
always answer our prayers, immediately.
And I think that it's because,
he's trying to grow us.
if you, every time you got on
your knees, you pray for something
and voila, it's there, then that
doesn't take a lot of faith, um,
but God wants to grow our faith.
all of the Old Testament, all of the
gospels are about growing our faith.
And so as we mature, I think God
holds some of the blessings back
sometimes to see, we're gonna,
we're gonna continue to have faith.
Even though our prayers are
not answered immediately.
and there are a number
of stories in the Bible.
I was just reading again about Abraham and
Sarah and how God, with withheld a child
for a while and it just a test of faith.
It was not only a test, it was
also a time period of growth.
And you know who you going to trust.
you going to trust?
What people say, are you going to trust
what the physical circumstances are?
Are you going to trust God?
And so I think that as we mature
in our faith, that God doesn't just
answer all of our prayers immediately.
He continues to answer some of our
prayers immediately, but some He
wants to grow us and It's, I think
about the children of Israel as they
left Egypt, and, God brought them
out of Egypt, and yet they turned
around, and here was Pharaoh's army.
Following them.
So why did God let that happen?
I think he, it was a test of faith.
It's, what I want you to learn,
where I'm taking you, you need
to learn to live by faith.
And so after God destroyed the
Egyptian army, he could have taken
them right into the promised land.
They could have been in the
promised land in two weeks.
And he took them out in the wilderness.
Why did he take them out in
the wilderness, I think it
was to train them in faith.
I think it was to prepare them for,
a life of faith, which is what he
wanted them to learn how to do,
to trust in him and live by faith.
And I think another example of why
that's true is because when, after
they were out in the wilderness for two
years, um, God told them to send spies.
into the promised land to check out the
land, or maybe God didn't send them there.
Maybe they just decided they
were going to send spies before
they went into the promised land.
And when they came back, ten of them
said, no way, we can't beat these,
Philistines, these Canaanites, these,
they're giants, we can't do that.
And what it proved is most of the people
had not learned how to live by faith,
only two of them understood what God was
trying to teach them in the wilderness.
And so they ended up spending a lot
more time in the wilderness because of
their Unwillingness or their, whatever,
they didn't grow in their faith.
And I think God puts us into wilderness
at times like that to grow our
faith and see, okay, you say you
believe and that you have faith.
let's see if that's true.
It's what he did to Job even um,
or allowed to happen to Job is a
test of whether he really had faith
in God or if he had faith in the
things that God had provided him.
And of course we know that Job had
faith in God far beyond his faith in the
things that God had provided in his life.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Yeah, that's great.
I appreciate you sharing that.
I was thinking about how, the Ten Spies,
they came back and they said that, and we
were as like grasshoppers in our own eyes.
And they saw themselves in relation
to the Giants as grasshoppers.
And so that was a They weren't seeing
themselves in their identity and God like
David did when he went up against Goliath.
David ran towards Goliath because
his self image was God was with him.
heh.
And he, God was gonna do
exactly what he was gonna do.
And So that's a, I we could have a long
discussion about identity in Christ,
but it does make a huge difference how
you view yourself in relation to God
and how you react to the world in all
these things we come up against in life.
So that's awesome.
it looks like we're about out of time,
so I want to just ask you, if you only
have one bit of wisdom to pass on to a
future generation, Somebody who may be
listening to this ten or twenty years
from now, or even now, just a, any one bit
of wisdom that you would, Want to share,
hoping that people would really grasp,
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
I think the only wisdom that I have
is what I've learned from the Bible,
and that is, if you want to have a
successful life, fix your eyes on Christ.
That's the key.
Fix your eyes on Christ and live
that way and, it's not my wisdom.
I think it's God's wisdom.
But I can't think of any other advice.
I remember before I went off to
West Point, Mama made that point.
She said, Jamie, there'll be times
where you can't do everything.
you're gonna have more
on you than you can bear.
Can do and she says that's when you
really got to put the other things aside
and focus on Christ And she was right,
I couldn't get those three great those
three courses up by myself I just had
to focus on Christ and do the best I
could and I think that's to me that's the
secret of life fix your eyes on Christ,
we do that by focusing on the word.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
And you gave us a great visual
with that tower you headed towards
instead of following your own way.
ha.
That was great.
would you pray for anybody
who's listening now?
There's somebody out there who,
is, your, God's going to hear your
prayer and answer it on their behalf.
however the Holy Spirit
leads you, pray for us.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
Okay.
Be glad to Lord.
We just thank you for our
many wonderful blessings.
And as I talked through my testimony
and what you've done in my life,
None of it is credit to me.
It's all credit for you and what,
the way you've cared for me and
my family and, my parents and my
siblings and my relatives such as you
just been wonderful to our family.
And I can't thank you enough.
Lord, I really believe as I've said, Uh,
over and over today is that, the secret
to success in life is to fix our eyes
on you to march towards you to work our
way through life focused on you and you
will help us deal with the obstacles.
You'll make them much
more easy to deal with.
We don't have to depend on our
own skills and our great intellect
and wisdom and all those things
that we think, can get us through.
We can depend on you and you
have all the resources we need.
You have all the wisdom we need.
You can see the future and
know what's best for us.
Just teach us, Lord, every day to
fix our eyes on you, serve you, and
become the righteous people you'd
have us be, in Christ's name, amen.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate1:
Amen.
Thank you.
you've really blessed me today,
Jamie, and I'm sure you've
blessed a lot of people out there.
GMT20231218-140610_Recording_separate2:
thank you.
I appreciate you letting me
be a part of this ministry.
Thank you.
CAILIN: We hope you've been
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No one has a story like yours, and you
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