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God Music People

My Fantastic Journey: It’s In The Lyrics

YES – My Lord & Saviour Jesus Christ IS My Strong Tower. He guides me. He directs me. He leads me. He is my Creator. He is my Provider. He is Eternal. He is Almighty. There is nobody that is greater than He.

4 years ago this week in August of 2006 He began the process to effectively put an end to my previous life. I’ve been celebrating my rebirthing not just this past week or this past month, but since the new beginning. The celebration is eternal.

Ever since I was a little kid I always believed in God’s existence. That’s because people told me that He existed. I think that if you ask 10 random people in the world today 9 of them would state that they believe in God, but how many of those 9 out of 10 actually know Him ?  How many of those 9 out of 10 actually follow Him because they truly wish to be more like Him ?  The numerical answer to that question is irrelevant, but your life should not be irrelevant. It should be relevant – so relevant that God truly knows who you are – and you truly know who He is and what His purpose for your Life is.

I didn’t know God before August of 2006, but now I do. Every week for the past 15 months here on this blog I’ve been writing about The God that I know and love. God called on me to be a Disciple here on Earth. He directed me to go forth and be His arms, hands, legs, and feet as I Live The Good News. If just one life was saved out there in the world because he or she read something that I wrote on here about God then it was all worth it. 

I should never get too comfortable as I walk this journey, for God loves new directions and new beginnings. As a result of a lot of thinking – and speaking to God about how I can better minister to the world in the future – I’ve decided to end this weekly blog post. This becomes the 67TH and final weekly edition of “My Fantastic Journey: It’s In The Lyrics”. This journey that God created for me continues infinitely into the light, and I can’t wait to see what’s in store for me just around the corner. With God leading me there it can only be GREAT !

Thank You for reading these words over the past 15 months. They were sent from Up Above. They come from The Truth. They are of The Good News.

May the Grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s holy people. AMEN.

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Blogging Driving History Life Music News Radio Travel

Saturday Night Retro

Volume 2 / Number 47 / Edition 96

On this 96TH weekly edition of my ‘Saturday Night Retro’ it’s time to continue my month-long-plus celebration that is ‘The Awesome ’80s In August International Dance Party’. After this edition I’ll have two more on the 28TH of August and the 04TH of September. I also begin the 3RD year of the ‘Retro’ here on this blog on that 1ST Saturday of September. Who would have thought back in 2008 when this blog was peaking that ‘Saturday Night Retro’ would outlive all of the other weekly blog series at that time. I mean – besides me ?

ON to this week’s ‘Retro’ and back during the Spring of 1989 Time, Inc. and Warner Communications merged to become Time Warner. It was the beginning of the end for Eastern Air Lines, as it went bankrupt after over 60 years in the air. The Exxon Valdez ran aground off the south coast of Alaska, and it created an environmental disaster at sea. My favourite theme park at Walt Disney World – The Disney-MGM Studios – opened its doors for the very first time. Gas prices were right around $1 per gallon as I drove all around South Florida in my sparkling new 1989 Geo Spectrum.

On the radio the U.K.’s Fine Young Cannibals scored BIG with back-to-back International pop and dance smash hits. Here’s one of my favourite songs of all time. It’s “She Drives Me Crazy”. It’s RETRO !

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God Music People

My Fantastic Journey: It’s In The Lyrics

This morning at my church service the Pastor taught from the latter portion of Ephesians 6 on ‘The Whole Armor Of God’. This is one of the first parts of Scripture that I ever read and studied in depth on my fantastic journey.

This week I’m celebrating the 4-year / 48-month anniversary of when my Lord & Saviour Jesus Christ rescued me from evil and darkness, saved me, and told me to believe in Him and follow Him towards The Light. I did, and 5 months later I went public with my faith by attending a church service for the first time in over 30 years. That was on Sunday January 21ST 2007. About 3 months after that I bought my very first Bible ever – “New Believer’s Bible: First Steps For New Christians” – at the Living Way Bible Bookstore in Downtown Homestead. About a month later the very first person that I formally met at that very first church service – Anne J. – bought me a really nice bible cover to protect my valuable investment in The Truth. Inscribed on the lower-right-hand corner of the front of the Bible cover is a sword pointing to ‘Eph. 6:17’. As soon as I saw that I went to the Scripture, and I let The Truth soak in to my heart and my soul. It read, “Put on salvation as your helmet, and take the sword of The Spirit, which is the Word Of God.”

In an unloving and an uncaring secular world I knew that as an outsider of the world I would need His armor to protect myself from the persistent enemy and his legion of followers that lurk in the darkness all around me. While the world rejected me over and over again, that same world wants me back – so that it can use me all over again. I refuse to give in. I refuse to go back to the lies. I refuse to be a servant of this world. I stand before God The Almighty One. I walk in peace as a Disciple of God. I am in this spiritual battle until the very end, and I will ensure that ‘The Whole Armor Of God’ is ON !

I’m forgiven. Because You were forsaken
I’m accepted. You were condemned
I’m alive and well. Your Spirit is within me
Because You died and rose again

It’s In The Lyrics:

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Saturday Night Retro

On This 95TH weekly edition of my ‘Retro’ I take you back 22½ years ago to the Spring of 1988. I remember it well. I was a young 20-year-old USAF Airman First Class (two stripes) on the verge of becoming 21 and a Senior Airman (three stripes) at bustling Homestead Air Force Base Florida. My total annual salary was about $11,000, but I had no car, lived on-base in a dormitory, and all of the food was free. I rode my bike to and from work on-base through the heat, the wind, and the rain. I dreamed of someday owning a car and driving it all around South Florida. That day would NOT occur in 1988, but rather in January of 1989. So back in 1988 I had friends with cars, and that’s all that mattered. All I wanted to do was to eat and party – and so I did. I ate and partied so much that I ended up gaining a lot of weight. In fact I reached my maximum lifetime weight of approximately 185 pounds !  That’s about 15 pounds more than my stable weight of today. I was not very healthy back then, and the situation would only get worse once I hit the legal drinking age of 21 that June (of 1988).

Back then during what I like to refer to as ‘The Golden Age Of Miami Top 40 Radio’ we here were blessed with three competing hit music radio stations – Power-96, Y-100, and Hot-105. All three played the big hits of the day, and each station also specialized in its own genre. Power-96 was a bit more urban than the other two, and Hot-105 actually played American hard rock and European club dance back-to-back. Y-100 was the heritage mainstream pop station of its time.

As I rode my bike all over the air base – dreaming of tuning in to each of these three stations on my eventual new car’s radio – this smash was playing everywhere. It’s the Spring of 1988 here in South Florida !

‘The Awesome ’80s In August International Dance Party’ continues next week as we enter the wild and crazy world that was 1989.

Until then my friends – “GET OUT OF THE CITY !” (Balki Bartokomous from “Perfect Strangers”)