My Life Belongs to Him

 

I have just recently discovered your book, Desire. It has been a God-send and just a healing for my soul... so I wanted to express my deepest thanks and praise for your ability to reiterate the heart of God to His people.

The last few months have been the hardest of my life. Everything fell apart, one piece at a time, in every single area of my life. I have been in relationship with my Jesus for many years now, but never have I experienced the hurt and betrayal as I have this past season. After seeing your book and, honestly, just really liking the cover, I decided I needed a new book to read and well, it has opened my eyes to so much.

I was never really taught that my life couldn't be what I wanted it to be... we get the desires of our hearts so, the childhood mantra of "you can be anything you want to be" was truth. After reading your book and realizing that I can't just create the life that I want, I was set free from all the pain and hurt and confusion. It has been so unbelievably liberating to just trust in the Lord! And how silly it all sounds, knowing that I've walked with Him for so long, yet failed to really see that my life belongs to HIM, and not to me! Should this not have been one of the first things I was taught? Should this not have been a foundational truth for my life in Christ?!

I bought several copies of your book and gave it out to all my friends, in church and out. I am also leading a small group study at our church. There have already been requests to have a second class once this one is finished.

Thank you so, so much for speaking truth and being vulnerable and transparent with your life... with your aches and pains and failures. I love real people. And that's just what you are. Thank you.

~Amanda M.

'Wild at Heart' Set Me Free

I'm 27, and I spent all of my twenties in prison, but Wild at Heart set me free. To be honest, no book other than the Scriptures has affected me more than Wild at Heart has. I hid behind a false self of a charming personality and overachiever to gain acceptance. The message of my wound told me "nothing would ever be good enough, you are not accepted, you are not loved." The traitor within conspired with the world to motivate me towards status and reputation. All that came crashing down while using my intelligence for the wrong reasons, developing a pretty elaborate embezzlement scheme at my workplace to finance my "image" and gain acceptance. Didn't work. No matter how much status, no matter how many "friends", I never truly felt acceptance or love. And it landed me in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

But is was a new beginning, a time to evaluate and start over. I had called myself a Christian and believed everyone else's perception of me as a "fine young man" to be true. They were unaware of my motives for who I was trying to be. My incarceration became a time of deep introspection and a time for God to heal and father me in a process to restore me to the man He had created me to be.

In 2005 I asked a friend to send me the book Wild at Heart and I read it for the first time with a friend. The message of its pages only scratched the surface. I eventually became involved in the Chapel Ministries at my unit joining the Chapel Drama Team and being a sound tech for the choir and band. In February 2008 I entered a brand new faith based dorm initiative titled T.E.A.M. (Transformation Empowerment And Maturity) Program. All the men involved in the program classes live together in the same dorm for the duration of the course. It was in this dorm I began to read Wild at Heart really trying to apply its message to my inner-self and outer-life. I began to read it with individuals who I believed would benefit from its theme and each session of reading became a time of incredible healing, confession, and understanding. The book became a tool to help men of all ages to see their wound, the message it brought, how God could fill the areas where the earthly father failed, how to fight our adversary, and how to truly fight for the beauty.

Around this time I wrote to Ransomed Heart Ministries asking for a Wild at Heart Facilitator Kit to possibly be used in our program. They were gracious enough to send it to us. Thank you guys. I embarked on an quest to get the book and DVD sessions implemented as a part of the program and had an outside volunteer willing to have it as part of his curriculum. I was met with great opposition from a member of program who had issues with John's theology. Imagine that. After a little confrontation and a lot of prayer I met with the program director and asked him to review the material and make the call. His mind seemed made up as he felt convinced that Wild at Heart promoted violence. But he agreed to review it. The next time he saw me he said "I looked at the DVD sessions and reviewed the book and I have to tell you....... I was impressed. That day, Wild at Heart became a part of the T.E.A.M. program.

It was also around this time (March '09) I became eligible for parole. After a participant completes the T.E.A.M. program there is the possibility that he may be asked to remain as a servant for a six month term to help facilitate and be given a group of six men to disciple. It was in my heart and I believed it to be God's will that I would be a servant in T.E.A.M. The day for my parole interview arrived and the Head Commissioner for my region showed up, which is a very rare event. He informed me that he was my deciding vote, that he voted against me previously, and that he would decide if I stayed or went this time. The interview lasted for about 45 minutes and when the subject of T.E.A.M. arrived I explained that I would graduate in June '09. Then I informed him that I believed I would be asked to be a servant in the program and explained to him what that was. I told him that I wanted to stay and be given that opportunity. I explained that the environment created in that dorm could not be duplicated any where else and that I was beginning to see healing and restoration in several men's lives as we generated deep bonds in Christ. I wanted to be a servant to the men there, even if it meant a set-off for parole. I know God was with me in that moment because no one in their own strength could ask to stay in prison to help others find freedom in Christ. He told me he didn't know what to do with me, but a week later I was given an affirmative answer for parole, setting me up to go home as soon as I finished my term as a servant in the program. God is God.

I was able to help facilitate the first Wild at Heart course, and interact with several young men and guide them on the journey of embracing God as their true Father. I healed and grew so much during this time as well. I wish I could share all the testimonies here but that is for another time and place. I was released in January 2010 and I am now trying to get back on my feet with a whole new approach to life and manhood. I am excited to see what God has for me next.

- Robert

Reclaimed

Thank you for your heart and your ministry.  My story mirrors that of so many others who have read the fruits of your ministry and have been reclaimed by a loving Savior.  My story is one of an absent father, two failed marriages and the belief that I "just gotta be nicer!"

God let me sink to my own version of hell and then pulled me from the abyss with the help of other reclaimed men.  The reclamation process culminated at the 2005 World Karate Championship where God pitted me against a 6'4" 268 pound mountain in the finals (of my belt classification).  I weighed in at a meager 178lbs.  At the age of 44, this was no small task.  Even though I spent many years in the military doing stuff stuff the military does, God made it perfectly clear that this was my validation match.  While I lost, thus finishing second, the true validation came when the head judge (a 4th degree black belt) said he was glad that I was fighting the mountain and not him!  I had the most beautiful black eye and a three foot tall trophy as my prizes from God.

Mine is just one story in a chorus of so many others who were helped through your ministry.  I know Ransomed Heart takes many arrows from all directions (sadly even Christians), but in my heart your ministry is invaluable. 

Today, I am married to a physician who seeks a life long journey with God and myself.  Together we make an annual trek to a slum in Rio to provide medical care and put on a soccer tournament.  The week long event is amazing to participate in.  But, each man and woman on the journey has been through his own version of hell.  I wouldn't have it any other way! 

Thanks again for your ministry   

Swords

Swords.  That’s what started my journey at age 30.  Well, let me back up.  When my brother and I were kids, we found a box in the garage which contained four or five obviously home-made knives.  We asked our father about it and he told us that he’d made them when he was our age.  We were hooked!  Dad helped us make some Japanese styled katanas out of some cheap cold rolled 1” wide steel, some brass pipe we split and hammered into guards (tsuba), some maple from the trees up the hill behind the house, and some bicycle inter-tube for the wrapping (ito).  My brother and I loved those swords and often sparred with them.  One day we were sparring violently while Mom and Dad were out (now keep in mind we were old enough to be left alone, but not old enough to know better, obviously) and Jack landed a blow on my hand.  The swords weren’t sharp, thank God, but the force was enough to cause a serious wound on my middle finger of my right hand…down to the bone.  My brother told me later that I’d turned an interesting shade of green when I looked at my finger.  

Needless to say that was the end of our sparring, but what we did take up was knife making.  We convinced our parents to get us Christmas present/birthday present combination of a drill press, sander, and metal cutting band saw.  Eventually, Dad even built a shed and coal forge for us.  My brother took off like wildfire making knives.  I only dabbled and got easily discouraged when things didn’t work out.  We also bought swords when we had extra cash, mostly cheap stainless steel junk that would break under any real usage.  Eventually the urge to make knives/swords faded as we went off to college, I for a music degree, my brother for a journalism degree.  The only vestige of my former passion that remained was the doodles in my notebooks of swords and knives I’d like to make one day.

Fast forward to late 2002.  I’m married with a child on the way and an eclectic job history that includes substitute teacher, meat and seafood wholesaler/retailer, music teacher, jewelry salesman, insurance salesman, Ford salesman, and bus driver.  All that in only two and a half years since I’d graduated college.  I would quit a job whenever it got hard or boring.  When my wife got pregnant I decided that it was time to stop fooling around and get serious about a career.  I needed a job I couldn’t get out of if I didn’t like it.  Solution? Military service.  I joined the Air Force.  Since they weren’t accepting “non-technical” degrees for officer school, I had to enlist.  I ended up in a career field that used skills I’d developed (albeit only a little) back when I was making knives and swords: Aircraft Structural Maintenance, better known as Sheet Metal.  The work and tools were familiar, and for a while I was satisfied just using the tools of my youth to put aircraft back together again.  

In 2006, after three years stationed in Anchorage, Alaska, we had to move to Abilene, Texas.  We loved Alaska, and would jump at the chance to go back, but we were told to move.  Since moving to Texas, we’ve endured family tragedy, heat, scorpions, joys, and sorrows, yet it wasn’t until I attended a Ransomed Heart seminar at Beltway Baptist Church and touched the swords that my childhood passions began to stir again.  Since that time I’ve started, and nearly completed, an MBA in Human Resources.  I’ve researched as much as I can about swords and knives.  I’ve learned that stainless steel is a poor choice for a sword blade, unless it’s just decoration.  Because of the unique metallurgy involved in the alloy, it actually makes a sword dangerous to use because it is easily broken unlike a carbon steel sword. 

I’m now close to separating from the Air Force and once I do, I’m going to get a regular job and set up a forge and make knives and swords.  I believe the Lord has directed me to use the proceeds of that business to help finance missionary/ministry organizations.  My passion for this has not abated as it has with so many other things in the past.  I see swords everywhere, the utility poles, the road looks gray like steel sometimes.  Whenever I see metal somewhere I wonder if it’d make a good sword.  I look at the railroad that rumbles through Abilene and think, “All I need for an anvil is a small hunk of that track, and I bet those springs on the box cars would make a good sword.  It is carbon spring steel after all.”  

Bottom line, Ransomed Heart Ministries has helped me re-discover my dormant passion.  I wanted to say thank you for re-awakening my soul.

A Restored Heart - Boot Camp August 2010

I almost didn't come to Boot Camp.  Even after I made plane reservations.  I was afraid to be with other men (intimidation).  But I came anyway because I was chosen the first time I put my name in the lottery.  I guess God did want me to go.

Before I came I knew that I had a very severe wound of shame.  However, during my Friday session quiet time with God, He showed me a tree that was dead and withered.  He said, "Son, you are not like that tree.  You are like that tree over there.  Tall, green, sturdy and strong."

God said, "Look around son. This is your adventure now.  But with adventure comes battles.  I will be with you during these battles."

I know the shame did not come from God or from me.  It's not my fault.  My heart has been, and will continue to be, restored.  I have something to offer.  I have something to give!