Joy During the Journey: Not What I Expected.

By Bud Lee

The author was just your average guy trying to make a living and at the same time have a family he could be proud of. But like so many other men, things didnt work out the way he imagined. He found while he was successful in business, he was a failure in marriage relationship. Since this failure was unacceptable to him, he set out to find a way to be better at relationships. Along the way he discovered God and accepted Jesus Christ as his Savior. He also married a girl who was willing to be patient while he learned from God. For a lot of people the story couldve ended right there, but for the author he wanted more than just a church membership. Because of his wanting more, and his appetite for investigation, which he used in his business. The Holy Spirit saw this as an opportunity to take the author on a journey of discovery. As the book unfolds the author has incidents that happened in his life defying the laws of coincidences, and so slowly, so ever slowly, the author starts admitting to himself God is in charge, and is taking him on a journey. Each step of the journey has been orchestrated to teach the author a specific lesson he will use in later years. Each of these steps the author has put into a separate chapter, because each of these steps was an unexpected surprise to the author.

• Language: English
• Publisher: WestBow Press
• Release date: Apr 6, 2015
• ISBN: 9781490871356

Bud Lee

The author was just your average guy trying to make a living and at the same time have a family he could be proud of. But like so many other men, things didn’t work out the way he imagined. He found while he was successful in business, he was a failure in marriage relationship. Since this failure was unacceptable to him, he set out to find a way to be better at relationships. Along the way he discovered God and accepted Jesus Christ as his Savior. He also married a girl who was willing to be patient while he learned from God. For a lot of people the story could’ve ended right there, but for the author he wanted more than just a church membership. Because of his wanting more, and his appetite for investigation, which he used in his business. The Holy Spirit saw this as an opportunity to take the author on a journey of discovery. As the book unfolds the author has incidents that happened in his life defying the laws of coincidences, and so slowly, so ever slowly, the author starts admitting to himself God is in charge, and is taking him on a journey. Each step of the journey has been orchestrated to teach the author a specific lesson he will use in later years. Each of these steps the author has put into a separate chapter, because each of these steps was an unexpected surprise to the author.

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Copyright © 2015 Bud Lee.

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This book is a work of non-fiction. Unless otherwise noted, the author and the publisher make no explicit guarantees as to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and in some cases, names of people and places have been altered to protect their privacy.

Scripture taken from the Holy Bible, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc. All rights reserved worldwide. Used by permission. NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION® and NIV® are registered trademarks of Biblica, Inc. Use of either trademark for the offering of goods or services requires the prior written consent of Biblica US, Inc.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version. Copyright © 1979, 1980, 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations taken from the New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. (www.Lockman.org)

WestBow Press

A Division of Thomas Nelson & Zondervan

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Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

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ISBN: 978-1-4908-7134-9 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4908-7135-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015903868

WestBow Press rev. date: 03/17/2015

Contents

Acknowledgments

Preface

Dedication

Introduction

The Early Years

My Venture Into Capitalism

My First Try At Relationship

Passion Strikes Again

My Introduction To God

Adding To The Business

Becoming Dad To the Girls

The New House

My Introduction To God’s Plan

Starting A New Ministry

Family Tragedies

Back To School for us

The Girl from the Pregnancy Center

Living in her Car

The Girl with the Motorcycle

Not All Houseguests Went Well

Sin in the Church

The Holy Lands

Changes for my Business

I Was Able to Say Thank You

The Man Who Lost his Memory

Judgments Are Best Left to God

What Does Retirement Mean to Me?

We Found our New Church

Counseling Married Couples

A Different Way to Minister

Lessons in Counseling

The boys have grown up

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

I have finished reading the manuscript and I have to say I was very blessed by what I read. I believe this is a story that must be told. It kept my interest and compelled me to keep on reading. I think the part that blessed me most was when the little girl whispered in your ear.

The book needs to be printed and hopefully will be wildly read. It is a story of a journey, a pilgrimage of faith, and the joy of discovering how God works in the lives of those who are committed to serve him.

Retired pastor and missionary.

When I came to stay with you it was a time in my life when I really needed supportive people, you and Bud were to of the major supporters in my life at that time. In conjunction with leaving home at a young age and then becoming pregnant, it was very difficult, but with your encouragement, friendship and support as a role model, it was what I needed. One thing I really appreciated was that Bud and you were always positive, but good with giving solid advice whether I liked it or not. The lessons I learned through knowing you and Bud have all been very positive, and the memories life lasting. Thanks to both of you for having such huge hearts, and welcoming me into your lives. I feel very blessed to have met you both. God bless you always.

Jane

A very inspiring story about Bud’s journey with the Lord to bring him to the right place at the right time. How God’s hand was always leading him, protecting him from himself many times. This encouraging story can help many of us understand how God loves and protects us and leads us to a place where we can find peace for our soul and contentment in our journey with him.

Pastor.

Bud’s story is not only about the joy God brings by his amazing grace. To read his story and know him today is to see God’s grace first hand. This book should give hope to all who read it.

Pastor

Preface

All of us have a journey we will take through this life, and none of us know what this journey will be. Some of us will take the journey prepared by the world and will only bring, at best, worldly happiness. This is the way I started out, and was only partially successful in the area of business. During the same time I was unsuccessful in the area of relationships. This mixture of success and failure was not acceptable to me, and I searched for a better way.

The majority of this book is about the discoveries I made while on my journey I have taken with the Lord, after I accepted Jesus as my Savior. It is not a roadmap for anybody else to duplicate. But if after reading this book you can gain some understanding of what I went through, and are willing to risk doing some of the things I did, then maybe you will experience the extreme joy I have with the Helper. I would caution you not to try all the things I did right away, the enemy could easily overwhelm you, to get you to stop. Instead try just one thing involving service to another person; there’s something about serving others that touches your heart. There’s another benefit about serving someone else, our service moves us closer to the Lord.

As you read this book celebrate my life with me. Yes, there have been some tragedies, but those things will happen in our lives no matter what we do. Remember, the Lord never promised us a trouble free life. But He did promise to carry us through the hard spots. Isaiah 43:1-2 (NIV)

Dedication

To my wife, Diane, you gave me guidance towards God. Along the way we became soul-mates, and I experienced the joy I never knew existed. Without you this book could not have been written, and my life could not have become complete.

Introduction

It’s Friday night, my wife Diane and I just got home from our Friday night date. We were sitting on the couch ready to relax and enjoy the evening when the phone rang. It was the wife of a couple who we were counseling because they had marriage problems. She told my Diane they were fighting and they were ready to call their marriage quits. Diane encouraged them to work out what they were fighting about, so she gave them some instructions and finished the conversation by saying we would pray for them all weekend. By Sunday night we were wondering what was happening with the couple, and shortly the phone rang again. It was the wife of the couple and she said they had a breakthrough in their relationship, and they were going to be able to make it in their marriage. We had heard those comments before so we asked them to show up Monday night for their usual counseling appointment so we could check out their breakthrough.

Monday night when they arrived we could tell by looking at them there was a definite change for the good in their relationship. The more we talked to them the more we realized they really did have a breakthrough. As we finished up the night the four of us, agreed they really didn’t need us anymore. We assured them if they did we were but a phone call away. As we walked them to the front door and said our goodbyes, we watched them walk down the path towards their car.

Suddenly in my head, which I can only describe as a message, there were no ‘voices and I didn’t know what to believe, the message seemed so real. The message said, your done with this couple, because I have a new couple for you on Monday nights. And then my message gave me the name of the couple. We hadn’t seen this couple for over a year, we didn’t even know if they were still members of our church. We were in a large church at the time, 2500 members, so losing track of people was a common occurrence as we had three services on the weekends.

As I shut the door I told my wife what had happened about this message. I remember her looking at me and just smiling. She didn’t say a word as if she knew more than I did which at the time, was probably right. I didn’t sleep well that night and the next morning I was still troubled. As I got to work the busyness of the morning temporarily put the message out of my mind. About 10 o’clock, when the morning work was complete, I told the crew I was going to my office to do paperwork. As I sat there trying to concentrate the only thing I could think of was that message. I had had enough education in counseling to know I wasn’t psychotic. But the message was so real, and I was getting increasingly uncomfortable. I also knew if I didn’t figure this out it could cause me to lose a lot of sleep, trying to figure it out let alone how it would affect my business. This was a dilemma I could not afford not knowing what to do.

Suddenly the phone rang, as I reached for it little did I know my life was about to change forever. In order to understand my statement, I need to take you back many years so you can understand what I’m saying about the significance of that message.

The Early Years

I was 32 years old. I owned my own business and I just gone through with my second divorce; the business wasn’t doing well, and the worst thing about it is I knew I was probably mostly to blame for my two divorces. Since my life so far had been self-directed, it probably meant I needed to make some changes, but how was the question?

Both of my parents were college graduates, and it was important to them my brother and I get a good education. While my brother succeeded in studies and getting good grades, I on the other hand, had trouble getting good grades, so I didn’t do well in school. My parents decided to have me tested to see what my abilities were, if any? It turned out my mind liked finding out how things worked and I had a natural aptitude towards mechanical things. The natural direction for me would be in that direction. During the summer of my 16th year I went to work for a truck repair company as a summer job. The owner was a friend of my dad’s, and as I finished the summer working for him, he made mention to my father I had a good mechanical ability. He suggested to my father I get educated in the repair industry.

My parents, at this point in my education, switched me from a college course to a general Ed course including auto repair classes. These classes were new to me, and I didn’t know many of my classmates. Since I was somewhat shy it was hard for me to make new friends. In the fall of that year one of my classmates in another class asked me if I could help him get his car started. Since he lived on my way home I said I would, and went to his house after school. In a few minutes, I found the problem, and in a short time had the car running. I felt quite proud of myself for having figured out the problem, and repairing it in a very short time. As I finished washing my hands and shutting the hood, I expected my classmate to drive me home. He said he didn’t have time for that and unceremoniously said goodbye. I was a bit taken back by his attitude, but I didn’t think too much of it and walked home. When I got home my parents wondered why I was so late. I told them my classmate had car trouble, and had asked me if I would stop on my way home and try to get his car’s running, which I did. I told my folks as I walked home I envisioned going into business and repairing cars someday. My parents, wanted to be supportive, and agreed that might be a good direction for me to take. This was a happy night for me.

The next day when I went to school another classmate of mine told me his friend had killed himself by putting a hose from his exhaust pipe into the car and breathing the exhaust until he died. I was stunned. I realized the classmate wanted me to fix his car so he could kill himself. It was as if somebody had kicked me in the stomach. I wondered what to do, if I told my classmate I had fixed his car so it would start, what would he think of me? I never told anybody I was the one who fixed the car. This experience taught me it would be wise if I asked a few questions before I volunteered to do something for somebody.

The high school where I was attending was next to a part of town most people tried to avoid. One of the groups who had their clubhouse in this part of town was a well-known motorcycle club. I had seen them around quite often, but mostly I heard them with there loud motorcycles. One day my best friend who had an older sister living in that part of town said he had to pick up something at his sister’s. Since it was his car we were taking to school I had no choice but to go with him. This was okay by me as I was in no hurry to get home. When we arrived at his sister’s apartment building, we were required to only Park in the visitor’s section.

As we made our way to her front door my friend said, I don’t think she’s home, but I’ve got a key to get in. As he opened the door, and we walked in, there in the living room sat his sister crocheting, but the strange part was there were four members of the motorcycle club sitting in chairs around her learning how to crochet. One of the guys who knew us said in no uncertain terms, "You will tell