Here I Am - part 3

Have you ever gotten a totally random phone call that altered the course of your life? July 7, 2006, my youth minister and good friend, David, called me. He said "You'll never guess who I just go off the phone with." You're right...so don't keep me in suspense, Dave. He says "I just got a call from a chaplain recruiter. I had put my name" he continues "on an information list two years ago, but I never heard anything from it. I had actually forgotten about it, and he didn't even try to give me a hard sell. He said he inherited this call list from another recruiter and was just trying to clear it off."

I barely heard anything after David said "chaplain recruiter." For me, that phone call was the heavenly throne room scene in Isaiah 6. The still small voice of the Holy Spirit blew across my heart, and at that precise moment I knew I was going to become an Army chaplain. Not because it was a lifelong dream...because it wasn't. Not because of my infatuation with the military...because infatuation will not sustain a new life direction. It was simply because my heart was finally bent to what God was clearly saying was His new direction for me.

I went home and told Andrea. We stayed up that night till 2:00 in the morning talking about it. We stayed up the next night again till 2:00 talking about it through tears, laughter, fears, and a thousand "what-ifs." I woke up the next morning, Sunday, July 9, to get ready to go preach. I woke up with the discussion of last night as clearly and presently on my mind as if I had not gone to sleep. There on my bed propped up on my elbows not even having gotten out of bed yet with Andrea still asleep beside me I said..."Okay, Lord...I will do it."

The next day I placed a call to Chaplain(CPT) Mark Perkins of the 5th Recruiting Brigade, and thus began the journey of Army red tape and hoops through which to jump.