October 9, 2019 – Click here to listen
I have many bad memories from New Orleans and have avoided going there like the plague. I believe the entire city is corrupt and under the sway of Satan and is a demonic stronghold of epic proportion. I lived there much of the time I was addicted to drugs and alcohol, committed many crimes, practiced witchcraft and other sins while living there and my brother committed suicide there. It is a morally debased capital of sin and it reminds me of visiting death row as one can actually feel the demonic presence of evil and darkness there.
So, one might question why I’m going to New Orleans in a couple of weeks to speak at a businessman’s prayer breakfast. In fact, when I was asked to participate by the chairman of the event I told him flat out that I swore I would never return to that sin filled city again. “Too many bad memories,” I told him. I could almost hear him smiling over the phone as he told me that every registrant has been charged with bringing someone who does not know Christ to the event. Then he told me that he personally calls and stands ready to mentor anyone who fills out a card stating they want to know more about how to follow Christ as their Savior. Your testimony is just what they need to hear.
Oh boy, he struck home with that one. I softened and after a few more minutes melted and agreed to offer my testimony at the event. In addition to having an evangelist heart for the lost that will attend that breakfast, I kind of think I had a “Jonah moment.” As you may or not recall God ordered Jonah to go to Nineveh, (modern day Mosul), and preach to the inhabitants there. He didn’t want to go because he felt that they were so wicked that they didn’t deserve to hear the Gospel, so he boarded a ship and headed another direction. God wouldn’t let that fly, and after several ominous events the crew threw him overboard to get rid of God’s curse whereby a giant fish swallowed him. After spending three days in a whale’s belly old Jonah had a change of heart and beat it on over to Nineveh to preach his heart out.
As much time as I spend offshore fishing one cannot be too careful.
I’m joking of course, but the bottom line is if God says go we would be wise not to say no. I remember going to a prison in Huntsville Texas and it was a “special unit.” That means it is a prison for sexual predators, snitches, and police officers who committed crimes. They house them separately to protect them from the other inmates who would kill them in general population. I did not want to go in there and witness to them. Some were in there for raping kids as young as six months old and other crimes so barbaric and perverted that it is too nauseating to even think about it, much less include it in this post. Prior to entering the unit, the Godly men that went in that day all gathered together and we prayed that God would strengthen us whereby we could do this. We prayed for some time and then went inside, and many inmates made decisions to follow Christ; most had tears in their eyes as they confessed their sins.
We were obedient that day and the key for me was focusing on Jesus. I don’t know how those men ended up so perverted and messed up. Perhaps the same things happened to them in their youth. Who were their parents? How were they raised? Jesus had those answers, not me, but He wanted them to hear the Gospel and that was clear to us. My job is to obey and not to question or second guess the Master’s orders. It is your job too. Don’t turn down God when your opportunity comes. And yes, you heard right, I look at it as an opportunity to serve God.
Ezekiel 3:19
But if you warn the wicked, and he does not turn from his wickedness, or from his wicked way, he shall die for his iniquity, but you will have delivered your soul.