Revelation 12:11 KJVS
And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.
I liked to drive fast when I was younger. Let me tell you what cured me of that habit. I graduated high school in 1969 and bought a brand new VW beetle. We lived out in the country and the VW was practical and economical. That little car could really go around corners with the engine above the rear wheel drive. Good car for driving in the snow. I totaled two of them in a couple years time due to drinking and driving fast. A few more older cars wrecked afterwards. Had a couple motorcycles. I had a 350 Honda scrambler, and a BSA 650. I dumped the 350 Honda on a corner one time going 40 miles an hour, with just cut off jeans on, no shirt. Had asphalt burns on my knees and shoulder blades as big as ones hand. Busted a front tooth in half on that one? Young and dumb, what can I tell you. I got drafted in 1971, the Vietnam war was going on. I was lucky I ended up in Germany. I was a medic and then a drug counselor. I drove armored personnel carriers and jeeps, and cracker box ambulances in my duties as a medic. A lot of fun, driving military vehicles. Got out in 1973. I got in another car wreck, but it wasn’t my fault. Broke the steering wheel on the car with my nose. I kinda straighten out for a while then. Got married, had two sons. A couple years before my second son was born, I was baptized full immersion in the name of Jesus Christ, and received the baptism of the Holy Spirit. Which was a very powerful and life-changing experience for me. It was the start of my love of scripture. In 1984 we bought a five speed Honda Accord. I had never driven a front wheel drive car before. That car was fast. I went into a corner I usually took at around 45-50 miles an hour, around 55 mph. I was in fifth gear, down shifted into fourth gear, and stepped on the gas. That’s how you would take a corner like that with rear wheel drive. It was early March, it had rained and the pavement was a bit wet. But as soon as I stepped on the gas, the front wheels lost contact with the road, and the car flew off the road. Front wheel cars will do that in a corner when a transmission changes gears.There was around a 15 foot deep ditch with a creek bank. I didn’t have my seatbelt on, and I was afraid I was gonna go through the front windshield, so I threw myself in the passenger seat. The car impacted on that side of the vehicle, so essentially I speared the passenger door with my head. I broke C-5 and C-6 vertebrates both in three pieces. When I woke up, the car was upside down I was lying on the roof of the car, and I smelled gas. The radio and lights were on, so I thought I should crawl out of the car. I can’t describe how god-awful terrible I felt. I was burning and tingling all over and very weak. Then while trying to crawl out of the car I paralyze myself. They put me in a Stryker frame for some time and then a halo vest and I was paralyzed for 10 days. If you have never seen one, there are 4 metal pins that are in a band around your head that press into your skull. That band is attached to four rods that are connected to a plastic vest. I still have depressions into my skull where the pins were. You can actually feel them with your fingertips. At the time of the accident, I was boning hams at a meat packing plant. I was 6 foot 1 and weigh around 205 pounds. Well muscled from a lifetime of hard work. In the 10 days that I was paralyzed, I lost 30 pounds of muscle. Then in 10 days I started to show a little movement in my right index finger. Muscle control return very slowly. They called me the miracle man in that hospital because it is extremely rare for someone to walk again after being paralyzed for 10 days. I can remember when they first took me down to physical therapy. They had a raised platform about as high as the seat of a wheelchair with a padded wrestling mat on top. They put me on the top of the mat and told me to try to sit up on my own. I can’t describe how bad I felt. I was tingling and burning all over. I was so weak at that time I could hardly brush my teeth with my right arm. I tried to sit up, but I couldn’t. I was too weak and in too much pain. I cried like a baby because it hurt so bad. I’ll never forget, two of the female physical therapist, neither one much over 5 foot tall and lucky to weigh 100 pounds each. Got me in my wheelchair and took me over to the side and said Luke, you’re gonna have to be tougher than you’ve ever been in your entire life if you wanna walk again. Well they shamed me. My dad worked me like a man while I was growing up. Before we got a chainsaw we would go up into the woods with a two man crosscut saw and cut down a red Oak tree and then cut the log up into 10 to 12 inch pieces and split them with a ax for firewood. At the meat packing plant I did it just about every hard job in that place. I thought I was pretty tough. So I toughened up and fought against the pain and weakness and I walked again. It took three months of physical therapy in the hospital to be able to walk 100 feet on my own. Those two therapist were wrong about one thing. I had to be a lot tougher the next 40 years living with the pain and weakness from a spinal cord injury. In 97 I had four vertebrae fused with a Casper plate put in my neck. Back in the halo again for four months. I could tell you a lot of stories about all the pain, muscle spasms, burning and tingling I went through over the years. I could tell you about stubborn male pride, and not asking anyone for any help in order to prove you were still a man. I will tell you this, I don’t care how tough you think you are, in the end pain wins. It wears you down and chews you up and spits you out. The first 30 years were hard. The last 10 years extremely difficult. There isn’t the day that doesn’t go by where I pray to God to just let me die in my sleep and be done with it. I’m weary, I knew 40 years ago I was fighting a battle I could not win. I’m tired of the fight.The only thing that offsets this despair I feel, is the frequent washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit that comes over me, Titus 3:4-7. It wipes the slate clean so to speak for a while and strengthens my resolve to carry on. And let me tell you the kicker to all of this. The day of the accident, my ex-wife’s cousin, who was a Pentecostal, called me. She said Luke I had a vivid dream last night that you were in a car accident and you were terribly injured. She implored me to be careful. Around 14 hours later I was laying in that ditch paralyzed. Took me many years thinking about that to understand that according to scripture. For many years, I thought why didn’t I just listen to that warning. Then in time I realized that dreams are prophetic. I had persistent sin in my life at the time. The small still voice of the Holy Spirit was warning me to knock it off. But I am a hard head. I did not listen. As my knowledge of scripture grew, I realized that the accident was my being chastised by God. God scourges the sons He loves. Read the 12th chapter of the book of Hebrews. The final verse of that chapter is as follows.
Hebrews 12:29 KJVS
For our God is a consuming fire.
What is consumed is the old man, the flesh, Ro 6:6. One of the most frustrating battles fought in all of this is described in an article I wrote for my website.
And after you read this, if interested, go to the title page and the first 10 or 12 articles on that page will cover my understanding of sound New Testament doctrine. Luke