2015 Christian Testimony: American Sniper, The Story of My Life for 2014 (Part 1)

But seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.-Matthew 6:33

This was my main spiritual focus for 2014. My guiding principle.

Seeking the kingdom first, got me a royal experience of warfare for 2014.

2014 was a rough year. It was brutal. As it relates to trials, I would say it was epic. Imagine you are fighting in a war, just like that scene in American Sniper, where about six soldiers were stashed in a building. They were in deep enemy territory, but they needed to take out the best sniper on the enemies’ side. It was sniper against sniper. It was American Sniper Chris Kyle, The Legend, against an Olympic sniper, The Butcher. After taking out The Butcher, they compromised their position and enemy combatants surrounded them on all sides and on every level.

What seemed like a hopeless situation turned into a demonstration of how God can turn a really bad situation for our good. Classical symbolism.

These soldiers called for help. There was a sand storm moving in. The rescue troops were twenty minutes out. The air support was one minute out but missed the target because of the sandstorm made it impossible to get in range and it was biblically intimidating. The firefight got intense but the storm made it impossible for either side to see each other at all, so they were shooting blindly. The rescue team got there just in the nick of time, for the soldiers to run out of the building and into the back of the truck.

As if he wasn’t fighting for his life, the American sniper had to fight for survival too. He was the last to get out and the truck was leaving him. He seemed to get shot, but his weapon took the hit and he chased that truck for dear life, when they pulled him in by his fingertips.

This sums up my life in 2014.

In reality, someone was purposely scratching my new 2009 Mazda car and using it as a chalkboard when it was parked at night. It was impossible to find out who. For several days, I would come out in the morning and my car would be scratched or windshield covered in gum. I was a slow building volcano, utterly frustrated.

Also I had a minor car accident, the person who hit me did not take responsibility and my insurance company didn’t want to go to court so they said I was at fault. The guys I hired did shoddy work and messed up the paintwork and rendering of the bummer. They stole about $25,000, in material for the job and my 2009 Mazda, looked a mess. The spray man decided he would sport with my car and be spotted at the bars with my car at night. My car also became a whorehouse, where sexual acts took place. Mind you this was all by April 2014.

I decided to turn to family. Lord give me strength, yet another example to me of why family members were just like everybody else. My cousin fixed only half the car and the side which was done, leaked the colour. So at the end of the day, my own family robbed me of $15000. I was left with 3 different shades of blue on the car and really poor paint job. This sowed and sprouted an oak tree of unforgiveness which I had to deal with in 2015.

Sigh.

Anyway, I was praying to God, still, for help and that I wouldn’t commit murder. Few months after this my cousin bought equipment for over $100,000 and it was destroyed in an act of arson. I honestly took pleasure in the fact that God had my back and those who deceived me would reap His vengeance and not mine.

Within this same time, I decided to tear down walls and widen my gate for my car to manoeuvre inside the yard. The workmen were lazy, smoked ganja, always needed more material, lied and wanted more money than quoted. By summer, I was again, disenchanted with mankind.

I wanted to break faces. I wanted to seek, destroy, decimate and rid the earth of such scum. I wanted to take names and reek plagues. I wanted vengeance; but, I chained the beast and appealed to God.

*****

This was a year, when I felt constantly surrounded. I felt like I had no hope. I felt like I had no saviour. I felt like after going out on one tour of duty, I was immediately sent out again to fight with the enemy. It felt like too much. I was being pushed well past my limits and I truly feared for my immortal soul. I wondered why the severity of the trials and I was concerned about my own psychological welfare.