God delights to advance the humble

by
Chaplain Kathie

Another message from Papa Roy I needed to hear today. He always manages to do it. I'm sure many of you have gone thru times when you do what you believe you are lead to do by God's guidance, doing the right thing no matter what price you have to pay, and falling flat on your face. Most of the veterans I talk to end up feeling this way because they did what they believed in but ended up suffering for doing it with PTSD and then further assaulted by trying to have claims approved. The truth is, it's not just veterans but almost every one of us.

I've been feeling really, tremendously depressed with my financial state and the fact that after all these years, no one has a clue I'm here. Thousands of people have watched my videos. When they were up on YouTube and Google video, the numbers were over thousands of hits but also they were being used by organizations for audiences. I have no idea how many ended up seeing them. My book, provided for free online, is another creation of mine leaving me no idea how many people read it. This was all fine to me and didn't really matter up until the last couple of years.

While I've been helping veterans since 1982, the last 5 years has been devoted to them full time. We moved to Florida so that I could work part time for a pay check while being able to do this work more. I keep getting hopeful the day will come when I am able to have some kind of income for my work, but over and over again, my work is used and I'm forgotten. I end up thinking that no one cares about what I know, what I have to share and it's time to just give up. After all, why should my family suffer for what I do? Yet every time I want to give up, God sends someone to me needing help, or someone contacts me wanting my advice. Doesn't do me any good financially but supports the thought that this is what God wanted me to do.

Am I deluding myself? I can't promote my work no matter how hard I try because frankly, I'm just not good at it and emails are private. I don't talk about them and they don't either. I have full confidence in what I know but then Satan's foot gets in the way and has me telling myself I'm no one from no where and no one will ever really listen to me. Senators and congressmen ignore the emails and snail mail I send. Phone calls are not returned. Groups I had hope in and supported fell apart. People I helped during all these years managed to rise far above me, leaving me behind and forgetting I was here first. It sucks being me at this point.

Yesterday, like many other days, I wondered why I torture myself working at least 70 hours a week without getting anything for it. Why do I have to wake up in the morning trying to snatch onto hope only to go to bed at night more depressed than I was in the morning? Then a reader of my blog left a comment that had me near tears. She thanked me for all the help I give. That helped more than she will ever know.

This morning I got back from having my car fixed with a $200.00 bill to pay. I struggled to figure out how to pay for it and again Satan's foot got in the way and made me regret the decision I made 5 years ago. As I opened up the emails, I had no will to read them. More and more heartache across the nation on top of the heartache I was feeling in my personal life was just too much to put myself thru. After all, it's probably one of the biggest reasons I have so few hits on this blog. Too many sad stories and too few good ones. Believe me, I search very hard for good stories in all of this. I'm just like everyone else. I need some hope too. I read about another Marine committing suicide, PTSD struggles and a few other political emails and then opened up this one from Papa Roy. It gave me back some hope in a very dark time for me so I wanted to share it with you hoping it would do the same for you. We all have times when we feel as if we are suffering unjustly but we never know what God has planned for us or what tomorrow will bring. With faith, we can get up tomorrow and find ourselves restored no matter what we face and know we are not alone.

God delights to advance the humble
by Papa Roy
When God brings us to grapple with the magnitude of his sacrificing love through his Son two thousand years ago, he doesn’t just leave us there. He doesn’t have us grapple with his past act of death on the cross alone. He tells us that he is here with us now! That is exactly what God did with Gideon. God was raising Gideon up for his purpose to rescue and deliver Israel from the oppression. Our God is not God of past, but God who is present now! And, it is his presence of God that made Gideon a mighty warrior. (Steve Kim)

Judges 6:12 And the Angel of the LORD appeared to him, and said to him, “The LORD is with you, you mighty man of valor!”

What we fail to realize many times is, there are lots of little ways God can and will use us if we just let Him. You can’t put a limit on God, you can’t put conditions on Him. He asks us to be faithful in the small things. Those supposed menial tasks aren’t menial at all when you are promoting God’s work and His word. The battle is waged and we each need to do our part to be prepared. We don’t know God’s plan or intention when He uses us, but He does. He can already see the outcome, He knows He picked just the right person to do the job.

Pray for our country

Gracious and loving God, today we praise You for the kind ways You reach to us, initiating and inviting our communication with You through prayer.

In God we trust: If God asks, you must be willing to be used of God and willing to say, “here I am Lord, use me”, and mean it.

Papa Roy