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The Years Did Teach Me

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  The Years Did Teach Me The years taught me things I would not have chosen to learn. That is not a complaint. It is simply true. Some lessons came through joy, but many came through pressure. Fatherhood taught me responsibility. Divorce taught me humility. Work taught me discipline. Caregiving taught me endurance. Illness taught me that peace can arrive in places fear expected to own. Grief taught me silence. Writing taught me return. At seventeen, I wanted clarity. I wanted the call to make sense. I wanted God to tell me what He wanted and how it would happen. I did not understand that God sometimes lets the years become part of the preparation. That kind of preparation is not neat. It does not always look spiritual while it is happening. It looks like getting through the day. It looks like paying bills, raising children, sitting in waiting rooms, making hard decisions, forgiving what still hurts, and writing words nobody may read for years. It looks ordinary unti...
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Listening Later in Life

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  Listening Later in Life Listening later in life feels different. When I was seventeen, listening felt urgent. I thought I had to understand everything quickly. I thought God’s call needed an immediate shape. I thought obedience meant knowing exactly what came next. Now, listening feels slower. That does not mean weaker. In some ways, it feels stronger because it is less frantic. I do not need every answer at once. I do not need to force the call into the first container I recognize. I do not need to pretend certainty when God is asking for trust. Age teaches some of that. Life teaches the rest. By the time a person approaches sixty-nine, he has learned that very few roads unfold the way he expected. Some doors open late. Some prayers take years to understand. Some griefs never fully leave, but they become quieter companions. Some callings return with more force because the years have stripped away the illusion that there is endless time to answer. That is where ...
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The Voice That Waited

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  The Voice That Waited God’s voice waited longer than I deserved. That is one of the truths I keep meeting as I look back over my life. I heard Him young. I sensed the call at seventeen. I knew something holy had touched my life, even if I misunderstood what it meant. Yet I did not move with clean obedience. I delayed. I questioned. I circled the same fear more than once. Still, God waited. I do not mean He was passive. He was not sitting at a distance, arms folded, watching to see whether I would finally get myself together. His waiting was active. Patient. Present. He kept speaking through Scripture, through longing, through holy dissatisfaction, through poems, through writing, through illness, through grief, through the ache of unfinished obedience. He did not stop calling. That matters to me now because I once thought delay could ruin everything. I thought if I missed the first clean moment, the call would fade. I thought if I misunderstood God early, maybe I had l...
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When I Could Not Hear Clearly

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  When I Could Not Hear Clearly There were times when I could not hear God clearly. I don't mean God was absent. I mean that I was crowded inside. Fear was speaking. Shame was speaking. Old training was speaking. The need to be acceptable was speaking. My own assumptions about ministry were speaking loudly enough that I struggled to recognize what God was actually saying. That happens. It is possible to love God and still hear Him through interference. At seventeen, I heard the call through the language I had. Preaching. Ministry. Pastor. Pulpit. Those words were not wrong, but they were not the whole. They became part of the interference because I mistook them for the call's full meaning. Later, other things interfered. Life became demanding. Fatherhood required presence. Work required discipline. Relationships carried their own strain. Survival took energy. The gift of writing would rise, then get placed back on the shelf because something else seemed more urgen...
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The Whisper Beneath the Noise

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  The Whisper Beneath the Noise God’s voice is not always the loudest thing in the room. Sometimes fear is louder. Shame is louder. Obligation is louder. The old need to look fine is louder. The practical demands of life are louder. Bills, family, work, health, grief, and exhaustion can crowd the inner room until God's whisper seems faint. But faint does not mean absent. There were years when the noise in my life felt stronger than the call. I had responsibilities. I had wounds I did not understand. I had patterns I did not know how to break. I had questions that made faith feel more complicated than I wanted it to be. God did not compete by shouting. He remained. That is one of the things I love about Him now. He does not need to become frantic to be faithful. He does not need to match the volume of our fear. His whisper can survive years of noise because it carries authority without needing force. I sensed that whisper in different ways. Sometimes it came as une...
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God Was Still Speaking

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  God Was Still Speaking Even when I did not know how to answer, God was still speaking. I see that more clearly now than I did then. At the time, I often measured God’s voice by my ability to respond. If I was confused, I assumed the message must be unclear. If I was afraid, I assumed I wasn't ready. If I delayed, I wondered whether the call had faded. But God was not as fragile as my response. He kept speaking. Not always loudly. Not always in ways I could explain to someone else. Sometimes He spoke through a memory that would not leave. Sometimes through a sermon that pressed too close. Sometimes through Scripture I had heard many times before, but suddenly seemed to be reading me. Sometimes through the ache that rose when I knew I was living smaller than the life He was asking from me. His voice was steady. I was not. That is an honest way to say it. There were seasons when I moved toward Him and seasons when I stepped back. There were times when I wanted Hi...
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What I Carry From Performance

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  What I Carry From Performance I carry compassion from the years of performance. That surprises me a little. There was a time when I looked back at the performed version of myself with frustration. I wanted to ask why he could not have been braver, clearer, more honest, more trusting. I wanted him to step forward sooner and stop giving fear so much authority. But I understand him better now. He was trying to survive. He was trying to stay acceptable in rooms where honesty felt risky. He was trying to love God with the language he had. He was trying to function while carrying things he did not know how to name. He was trying to keep moving without falling apart. That does not make performance good. It makes it understandable. There is a difference. Performance may begin as protection, but it becomes a prison when it keeps the real person from responding to God. That is what I carry forward from this part of the story. I do not need to hate the pattern in order t...
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