How Has God Moved in 2019?

From the Salvation Army, you're listening to Wonderful Words of Life. Welcome everybody and Merry Christmas. It is my privilege to introduce our producer, Mr. Chris Benjamin. I'm really excited to join you, Bernie, and I'm excited to be on the show. It's funny, I actually usually prefer to be the behind-the-scenes guy, but this Christmas series is really special to me. And just the way it turned out, I was really excited to get to share with our listeners a little bit of the heart behind the series and the concept of this.

But also just say thank you for listening, those of you around the world. We love hearing from you, and it's just an honor to get to be in this position to do ministry that we know is impacting countless people. It really is exciting to have Chris on the program because we get to talk about one of the initiatives he's had, particularly for these meals around the table. You know, during the holidays, during Christmas, Thanksgiving, I think we tend to think about family more than we normally do the rest of the year.

Maybe we kind of take each other for granted the rest of the time or we're just too busy. But during the holidays, as we gather around a meal, especially at Christmas, those deep conversations that we have with maybe people that we don't see that often or we don't even take the time to just have a meaningful conversation with, those conversations, I think, are worth sharing. And so this series is basically us just eavesdropping on some of our friends as they have a Christmas dinner and share their testimonies and get into a little bit of theological conversations and even potentially debates.

We have two different tables that we're going to be visiting. And the first table that we're going to be at is actually our friend, Giovanni Smith, and two of her friends, Kayla Hedgren and Charlene Capehart. And hearing these three girls talk, I mean, first of all, just hearing the bond that they have is amazing.

But these are three powerful women of God that are already doing incredible things for the kingdom. And I know you're just going to be blessed by their stories. And then we'll move on to our other table, which our friend Bernie right here was at, along with his lovely wife, Laura. And we're also joined by Commissioner Willis Howell, who's the commissioner for the Salvation Army, U.S. Southern Territory, as well as Major Jerry Friday, who's my boss, and as well as Mercy, who works in our department. So if you've ever called Soundcast or sent us an email or a Facebook comment, she's who you spoke with. And so we're excited to share this. And then we're also joined by our own Lori Miller.

Yeah. And we want to say a special thank you to all of those folks that joined us around the table. And we're a little bit vulnerable for the evening that we recorded that, but we want to say thank you to you. We hope this is a blessing to you. And it's our prayer that just someone's story is really going to hit you where you are now.

And God is just going to use in a powerful way. Hi! Hey! It's a party! It's going to be a good night.

I'm excited. Ooh, and Chinese. Chinese, though. All right. What would be your favorite Christmas memories or not good Christmas memories? Well, we had I remember because my you guys know my siblings are 15 and 17 years older than me and then even older than Jordans. But we would have we only had a few Christmases where we were all still in the house. But one year they bought us a karaoke machine. We had an oldie CD.

This is how I learned all my love shack, baby. I mean, this was also so we I was going to say that was one of my favorite Christmases we had. It was all of us still in the house. I think it was our last one together. And we were in front of that karaoke machine all week. So listen, one Christmas, I got me a boombox for my parents. And then the following year, no, I think it was the same year my aunt got me the Sierra CD and Mario Mario. But Sierra, when it was like a boy, the hurt out of that.

That's hilarious. I think for me, I remember Christmas. I want to say it was ninety nine. My my dad acted like he didn't get any of us gifts. Little did he know that he kept all the gifts in the attic.

I would have fought him. But no, but me and my brothers, we went up to the attic. So we knew like so. So like he was like, oh, yeah, we didn't get any gifts. And then we were just like, oh, really? OK, we playing the cool because like so then he came through and he was like, he rang the doorbell cheesy like or whatnot.

It's like we got all the Christmas. Yeah, he was not. No, he was not.

I would have been so embarrassed, mortified. I don't think I ever believed in Santa Claus. So. OK, you know, my mom still signs. She still signs some of our gifts from Santa. I think that to this day, to this day, I don't think my my parents just never pressed Santa like that. You know, my parents never pressed Santa, but I chose to believe. Exactly.

Some hope. Right, Laura. So, Laura, what's one of your memories of Christmas? One of the big things for us is my dad always making breakfast on Christmas Day. All right.

That's very nice. You can almost smell it now. Yeah.

Still eggs and toast and bacon. Mercy, what about you? We were 12 kids in the family. Oh, Mercy. So let's go from this.

Yes. So I'm the baby. And we always get together on Christmas, no matter where my brothers and sister were. Christmas came home in my town.

I live in a small town in Columbia, South America. And the only TV color TV at the time it was in our house. So all the kids in the neighborhood Christmas morning, they will come to our house for whatever reason to watch TV, to play with us. So it was fun.

It's a lot of fun. My dad would sometimes be gone for Christmas. He was in the Navy. And in those days to be gone on a ship, you could be gone for nine months, a year at a time.

They try to tighten that up a bit now. And so I can remember odd occasions when he wasn't there for Christmas. But I can also remember I can close my eyes and see our sort of now by our today's standards, a Charlie Brown kind of Christmas tree and just a branch here, a branch there, you know. But oh, it was so special because it was all decorated in the tinsel. So the music of Christmas was always very special as as I began to play an instrument myself, going out and caroling and that kind of.

So just there's a lot of warm memory. Looking back, what were some of your highs and lows for 2019? And what are you looking forward to 2020 or like what's some of the big things for you in 2020? I think 2019 for me was a year of transition. You know, I moved to Atlanta at the end of August of 2018. And I don't think I really got settled here in Atlanta till probably March of this year. So I feel like finally finding community, finally feeling like this is home now that I'm settled into a place, like continuing to build the community that I have and strengthen those relationships. You know, I just moved here September, you know, around the same time.

Yeah. Like for me, it was just all about learning, learning, growing, finding true community, being around real people, real energy, real vibes. Being able to challenge my close friends to to go in deeper in the word and and really living out like the kingdom. Well, I think we've talked a lot about like what does it look like to have a community that's not just like talking the talk. You're walking the walk to write like we're not just saying we're praying for you or we're not just saying we want things to change or we want to like do life together.

But what does it look like to actually take action? And I think now having the relationships where you can do that. Twenty nineteen is coming to a close.

So jump ball here. How was twenty nineteen for you? Twenty nineteen was an exciting year for me. I received a new appointment that I absolutely love and we haven't stopped, especially with the Soundcast group there.

They're always coming up with exciting things. So I'm very excited what 2020 is going to hold for me was very special. In the beginning of the year, like the beginning of twenty nineteen, I felt a lot of pressure on my household bills.

The house being clean. I have a two year old boys, which is that's a handful. Yes, to say the least. So I felt a lot of pressure because everything was on me. I felt like my husband was just there to work, bring the money in. That was it until I prayed to God. I say, you know what? I can't handle this anymore. I can have this pressure.

I don't think he's the right guy for me because I need somebody to actually help me. Grow as a person, be a father from a boy, you know, those sort of things. So I pray hard and I say, God, just give me a sign. So this day my car broke down.

It was in Helen, Georgia. I accidentally lost the key and everything inside, meaning cell phone, everything. I didn't have anything with me. I didn't have any phone numbers. I don't I don't call people.

The only phone number I know by heart is my husband. So I call him. I said, hey, listen, I broke down.

This happened with the baby. And he says, where? I say in Helen. I'm in Helen, Georgia, which is hour and a half away from my house. And he said, OK, listen, I have a meeting to go to. So when I get done, I will call you. I say, call me where? I don't have my cell phone. I'm calling you from a place. And he's like, let me call you right back.

So that meant for me, this is it. I don't need somebody who tell me that. It's my husband. His responsibility to go pick me up, like say where? Give me the address.

Give me the name of the place. I'll go right away. No, he didn't do that. He had a meeting with somebody else, which I felt that's more important. So when I came home, when I finally my brother went pick me up, I came home and I told him, why wouldn't you tell me I'm going to come and pick you up instead of having a meeting? So he's like, well, I had a meeting.

So like this is it. I don't want to see you anymore. I need a father for my child.

And best of all, I want a husband for myself. I don't want you here. So he left for a week.

He went to his parents house, came back a week later. Totally different man. I mean, I cannot I cannot express. He is just totally different. He is the man I wish he was before that accident. So I thank God for that accident, you know, for whatever happened to me and Helen, because it brings back a new husband. Transformation.

So I honestly that was God working in my life. 2019 is not a year I want to hold on to. I'm ready for 2020. We've had a lot of challenges that we're facing and we've been facing for years.

And just in all honesty, which I always am, probably to a fault. Yeah, it's not been a great year. You know, we're looking at some losses and we're looking at some challenges in the future. But in it all, you know, what I've learned over those years is that in those places, in those real hard wilderness desert places where God does his best work. Yeah, it does stink sometimes. That's also part of Christmas, isn't it? It's into the darkness. It's into the yuck. It's into the the the the the gloom of it. The light of hope. Just absolutely. And that's into where Jesus is born. That's where he comes. And that's the hope.

Yeah. The Salvation Army's mission, Doing the Most Good, means helping people with material and spiritual needs. You become a part of this mission every time you give to the Salvation Army. Visit salvationarmyusa.org to offer your support.

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