Inspiration Friday

Inspiration Friday

I am joining Debra at Common Ground today for Inspiration Friday... Please join her and be inspired!

November 18th two years ago my father went to be with his Heavenly Father, my inspiration today comes from him.

My father was an only child born and raised in South Dakota to a blacksmith/farmer and a loving  Austrian. He went to WWII as a Seabee in the Navy, he always felt fortunate that he spent that time rebuilding and not fighting. 

He married his high school sweetheart on an overnight pass and after the war, went to art school in Mpls. MN. I was born there 4 years later. He worked as a graphic artist out of a studio in our home and started his own business doing a lot of work for Moody Press. He came to the knowledge of the Lord before I was born and spent the rest of his life spreading the love of God.

He was such a talented man, there wasn't anything he couldn't do well. He could pick up an instrument and play it, he sang beautifully and painted with great perspective. This is my favorite painting of his. He wrote a couple of books and could hold an audience for hours speaking and teaching. With that of course there is a wrinkle, he had high expectations of himself and others and lacked an inner confidence which you would never know or see.

He stepped out in faith and started a church when I was a teenager. There were 4 of us, I have two brothers and one sister. He felt the calling of the Lord on his life and gave up his business became an ordained minister and started Compassion Christian Center.
At that time, the rebellious teenager that I was, I thought he had gone off the deep end. Now I look back and can't imagine the faith that it took to totally depend on the Lord. 
The Lord was faithful and blessed Compassion. 
It wasn't easy.
During that time my brother had just graduated   from high school and was an apprentice to a carpenter, that fall while hunting he was shot and he died on the way to the hospital. It was a hard time for our family... I watched my dad at his sons funeral stand and preach the love of God.
My father went on to preach the gospel all his life, he got his Doctorate in Theology at the age of 72.

We are called to become followers of Christ and that does not mean your life becomes perfect, on the contrary, it is not meant to be easy. He is forming us into His image and through growth there is pain. It is not an easy walk He has called us to but I see no other way. 
My father, was not a perfect man, he made major mistakes in his life and wasn't always easy to get along with. But from his speaking tours across the middle east to his home meetings he was known as
"The Love of God Man"
and
My inspiration...
Blessings
Rebecca