1,500

On April 29, 2008 I sat down and wrote a blog. That was nearly nine years ago. In that time there have bene many ups and downs. I have served three different churches in that time. I have traveled to two countries and several states to preach.

In that span there have been many ups and downs. I have been as close to God as I have ever been and at other times felt very distant from Him. I have enjoyed the outward signs of successful ministry with salvations, baptisms, growth and revival. I captured the 23 day revival in Seminole all on this blog. I have also known failures, stumbles, and struggles in ministry.

Over those nine years I have watched two of my boys graduate and go off to college. Our happy family dinners of six are now to do dinners of four. The two youngest boys had to have knee surgeries .

I watched Faith Community Church explode with growth and then plummet with declining attendance. We rejoiced in baptisms and mourned the death of beloved parts of our body. I have faced more financial trials than I can recount and at the same time seen God come through in miraculous provision. Each time I thought the church would go under financially God stepped in and did something amazing.

I have fought demonic attacks. I have battled with the most severe depression I have ever known. I have preached my heart out week after week. There were Sundays I felt so discouraged I thought there was no possible way I could preach. Each time God helped me.  I preached some of what I consider the most powerful messages God ever gave me during this time. I preached revivals, campus, youth rallies, and the normal pastoral messages. Much of what God gave me to preach ended up in these blogs.

Through it all, all the ups and downs, all the successes and failures, all the faith and doubts, all the joys and sorrows, and all the hope and frustrations I wrote. I wrote a few books. Mainly I wrote right here. At times the writings were emotionally raw as I bore my heart. At other times they were written to encourage suffering people. I wrote about prayer, faith, deep devotion to God, and hard hitting prophetic messages.

A few times over the years I received feedback. Those words were encouraging. They were like extra oxygen to a winded athlete to help me keep going. They kindled the fire to help me keep writing. All of the writings with the goal to be a vessel of God. I never wrote for money. I have intentionally never allowed advertisements on this blog because the goal of the writing was never about making money. The goal of this blog has always been to help people for free.

I recall several milestones along the way. Last year I wrote the most blogs in a year I have ever written. I recall when we had 1,000 visits to the blog and years later 10,000. My long term dream was to see 100,000 visits to the blog. We hit that last year. I've hd to readjust those goals. Maybe the goal now will be a million.

Today I hit another milestone. I give all glory and credit to God. He gave me this talent and passion to write. He continually gives me inspiration. Sometimes it shows up in poetry. Sometimes it is inspirational, instructional, theological, and prophetic. Through every season of life God has allowed writing to be therapy for me. I have literally written my way through the past nearly nine years.

Today I wrote the 1,500th blog. Some admittedly are better than others. Some have resonated more with readers than others. Some I thought that were not that good got a large readership. Others that meant much to me did not ever get traction with other readers.

1,500 blogs. Thank you Jesus. Thank you for helping me on this journey with the gift and therapy of writing. Thank you for those you have sent to read. I pray you would send these little writings all over the world and touch people I will never meet. I ask you to let them land before both great and small. And thank you all of them are available for free. In Jesus' name. Amen and Amen.