A New Season – Hasta Luego, Houston

Judy and I are beginning a new season in life. We are leaving Houston to move to the mountains of North Carolina. I have lived on the Gulf Coast for 43 years. It is flat here. Living in the mountains will be strange.

Judy has been ready to move to live near the grandchildren for years. I have resisted moving because of friends and ministry. For a while I couldn’t imagine not being able to ride bikes with Tom, pray with Joey on Thursday and Jim on Tuesday, mentor Damon (who also mentors me), meet with Matt and the guys, eat chinese food with Ryan, worship and teach at FPC (especially the BASICS, Boomers, and Trinity classes), eat dinner with Claudia and Alan, spend time with Danny and Carol, minister to the many people God brought into my life each week, meet with the guys in the several men’s groups I am a part of, meet with the small group at Robert and Linda’s house, and the men and women of the Prayer Team. Yikes. That is a long list.

I am ready to leave now. Not because I want to leave. In a way, I don’t. I am leaving behind, what for me, is a rich life. There is a mixture of excitement about what God is going to do and grief over what I am going to lose.

I am ready to move because God is showing me a new way. God has told me that I need to honor Judy’s wishes, joyfully. Over the last 6 years other people have gotten more of my time than my wife has. I am being called to rectify that (she would say “up to a point”). My grandchildren need their grandfather. My grandsons are getting to an age that will allow me to have some meaningful interaction with them and I have recently seen how much they enjoy our time together. Hopefully, if I lay a good foundation now I will still have a role to play in the lives of my grandsons and granddaughter when they become teenagers. I want a place in their hearts, and I want to place in their hearts a love for the Kingdom of God.

I feel God is sending me from Houston to North Carolina for these reasons but also for another one. Yesterday as I was praying God reminded me of Elijah and Elisha. Elisha asked Elijah for a double portion of his spirit. I have been asking God, in effect, to give me a double portion of His Spirit; to draw me deeper into His heart and to heal those wounded places in my heart that prevent me from receiving the Father’s Love.

As Elijah was being taken up to heaven his mantle or cloak fell to the ground at Elisha’s feet. Elisha took off his clothes (mantle), tore them in half, and discarded them. Then he took up the mantle of Elijah and put it on. Elisha went on to perform about twice as many miracles as Elijah for the Kingdom of God.

God is calling me to take off the old mantle so that He can give me a new one. He told me clearly that I cannot receive the new mantle while I live in Houston. The temptation to follow the old ways, as good as they are, will be too great. I have to leave, even though that will be hard. Leaving is how I remove the old mantle.

The new mantle is for me, but it is not for me. God wants to answer my prayer – “give me a double portion of Your spirit”, which translates into more of His power. I am not sure how that will manifest in my walk. One thing is for sure. It will be His Spirit for His purposes. Not for mine. In some way, God will use me to release the Kingdom of God into the kingdom of the world, in North Carolina and beyond. If I make it about me, I will corrupt the gift.

I am entering a season that to many people will seem predictable, a normal stage in life. “I get it. You want to live near your grandchildren”. But there is more than that going on. As God grows us, we will all periodically reach places in our walk with Him where we will have to jettison the old life, as good as it is, to allow Him to lift us up to a new level. Generally, it will be hard to do; we get comfortable. But sometimes that comfort can be a kind of spiritual death. It is our choice. God will wait on us until we have chosen the path He has laid out for us. Maybe I waited too long. I don’t know. I am ready to go now.

I feel like I have been slowly approaching a line in the sand. This has taken several years. During this time, outwardly, nothing changed. And then, with one more tiny step – boom, I am over the line. This makes the decision to move seem abrupt. Actually, it has been in the works for a long time. This journey has been orchestrated by Him, not by me. Hallelujah!

I thank God for all of the people He has allowed me to touch, and who have touched me, in Houston over the years. Literally, many hundreds. I have touched some I will never know and some touched me in ways I still don’t understand. Most of those relationships have been positive and life-giving. Others not so much. All have been woven into the tapestry of life I call Houston – home, the body of Christ. What a great gift you have been to me. I will never forget all y’all (as we say in the South).

May God give us all an extra portion of His grace, peace, and freedom today to accomplish His purposes – push back the darkness, take back the territory – for His glory.