My Faith Has Made Me ________

By Rayburn Hare

Faith means many things for people. This is a book about true faith and how it relates to everyday life. It is the opinion of this author that faith in the person of Jesus Christ is the only faith that provides hope for this life and life after death.

Reading this book will challenge anyone to do more than you ever thought you could. This book will demonstrate how faith in the power of Jesus Christ and His Word can lead a man to lead his family on a journey across the country based on faith in the Word of God.

Have you failed in life? See how God uses failure to accomplish His purpose and prove how He can cause all things to work together for good to those that love and trust Him.

The Bible: Is it just some old outdated book written by a bunch of dead people? Can the Bible really act as a light and a lamp to our path? Does God really show us how to live by reading and obeying the Bible? If you choose to read this book, you'll see how the Bible is alive, how it speaks and leads one man on his journey. The greatest book ever written is on display throughout this book in a fun and practical way.

Age is no excuse. This book covers over a forty-year time span and shows how God can and will use anyone at any age willing to follow and seek after Him. You will learn how faith will lead to faith and how God is still at work, leading this man to seek His God and do more than he ever thought possible.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Christian Faith Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Apr 19, 2021
• ISBN: 9781098069803

Book preview

1

Let’s Do Twenty

I love movies and movie lines. In We Were Soldiers, a Vietnam war story with Mel Gibson, there is a line that describes how I feel about writing this book. At the end of the movie, after a moving scene of victory and true act of bravery, a photographer says to Colonel Hal Moore (Mel Gibson), I don’t know how to tell this story.

And Hal Moore says, You have to tell it. You have to tell the American people how my soldiers died.

Well, this isn’t a story of bravery or risking of life, but it is a story that I feel I have to tell and feel compelled to tell. Not because of me and my accomplishments but because of God and His mercy and how He has helped me do more than I thought I could and go further than I ever thought I could go. This is a Join with Me effort to say He wants to help you where you are in life, to attempt something you don’t think you can do, and He will help you do more than you ever thought possible.

Because this is true of me, I believe it’s true of you as well. Believers all over this world are unwilling to step out in faith because they want to play it safe and are unwilling to risk failing at something for fear or simply unbelief. Matthew 13:58 says, Jesus did not do many miracles because of unbelief. What I am finding is that if I’m willing to step out in faith and believe Him, there is nothing He will not do to accomplish His purpose. No matter your age, circumstances, or abilities, God can and will use you to accomplish His purpose. The real question is, do I believe that statement?

This story has its beginning in Goldsboro, North Carolina, in the year of 1975. At that point in my life, my idea of a fast run was going from first base to third base, all out, to beat a throw. A long run would be to hit a home run and take a slow trot around the bases. I didn’t run and really didn’t give much thought to running. I was working out and lifting some weights at the field house of a community college I was attending, and some of the guys were running, so I figured I would try, but not with them. I had to do it on my own so I would know if I could do it or not because I would never risk failing at something or have someone think I couldn’t do something as well as they could.

That was my mentality then, and I still fight that today, which is a big dose of pride. So I put on my Converse tennis shoes and took off around the block at my home and got about 360 feet (the distance from home plate to home plate) and could hardly breathe and had to stop. I walked a bit and started again and wound up taking about twenty minutes to complete a mile.

That’s the neat thing about running. You can look like a runner, talk like a runner, and act like a runner; but once you start running, reality strikes, and you can’t fool anyone. But I didn’t get discouraged because it is something I wanted to do. Here is the neat thing about God. Even though I had no spiritual desires or any thought about God at that time in my life, God can and will accomplish His purpose. God was at work with me, and the foundation of this story started at a time when I had no regard for spiritual things.

So I ran and kept on running. Next thing I knew, I was doing a mile without stopping, and then it was two miles without stopping. My friends were doing three and five miles, and I just cut the route short to get my two miles in. This went on for several months, and I was feeling pretty good about my progress. This is where the story gets interesting. Some of the runners were teachers and administrators at the community college we attended and had friends in the community. Someone asked one of our group if we would participate in a twenty-mile fundraiser. Most were walking the twenty miles, but our group decided we would run, or at least they did; I certainly had no input on that decision.

So I agreed to try. You have to remember I had never run over two miles and had only been running for about six months total. My thoughts were that I would take off and look the part, but after a few miles, I would fall out and walk. We started on a Saturday morning. There was a photo taken for the local newspaper, which is the only one that I have. There were only four from our group, and I was the weakest runner of the bunch—two school administrators, my close friend, Allen, who was the best runner of the whole group, and me. Off we went, looking good and feeling good.

What took place that day was one of the most amazing things I’ve ever experienced. This experience taught me many lessons, which I still draw upon today. I ran farther than I ever thought I could and accomplished something I thought was impossible. Once we got to the two-mile marker, I began to think, Well, I’m sure I’m about done but I seem to feel okay. So I kept going. I have no clue what kind of pace we were doing. We didn’t have Garmin gadgets back then and never thought to time our pace with any gadget. I well remember when we went past the hospital, thinking, Well, I’m glad I’m close to medical help because I’m probably going to drop soon.

The amazing thing was I didn’t drop, and I kept thinking I couldn’t do this, but I was doing it. For twelve miles, I ran, and we stayed together. What finally caused me to stop was blisters. Once we got in front of a local sporting goods store where I knew the owners, I had to stop and get some help. I went in and took my shoes off. My feet were bleeding from all the blisters. They were kind enough to clean my blisters, put some Kramer’s Vaseline on and tape my feet, and back out I went. My friends had continued the run, and I was not about to quit. From that point on, I ran for a while and walked for a while and was determined to get to the finish.

By the time I got to the finish line, my legs were hurting so bad that I could hardly walk anymore. I mean, I was hurting in ways I can’t describe. I wanted to collapse and almost did. My feet were bleeding, and once I stopped, I could hardly put one foot in front of the other.

I’m trying to describe the event for several reasons. Not because you should say, Wow, look at what he did. Quite frankly, it was one of the dumbest things I’ve ever done because I thought I had done permanent damage to my legs. My feet took weeks before I could put shoes on. I remember going home and just collapsing and telling my mom what I had done. I wouldn’t begin to tell you what my mom had to say, but she was one of the best caregivers I’ve ever known. She had some remedies she thought would work, like a tub filled with ice, and once I got into the tub, I couldn’t get out.

I’m really not exaggerating about how bad of a shape I actually was in. I remember hurting so bad through the first night that I could hardly bear it, but I think what was worse was hearing my mom remind me just how stupid I was, and she didn’t feel sorry for me at all; but of course, she still cared for me and loved me as she always did.

Weeks later, after I recovered, I went back to running with a newfound confidence. Running a few miles was no problem. I knew from that point on that I could do more than I ever thought possible. While my mom thought I was stupid—and I probably was—God used that and is still using that episode of my life for His good. You see, our bodies fool us all the time, saying you can’t when you really can!

The truth is, the accomplishment is not near as important as the attempt. I have learned that by stepping out to do some things that I didn’t think I could do, allowing God to show up and show off and prove Himself all-powerful. From that point on, running became a part of my life. I ran and ran and got better at running, all because I took the first steps and never looked back. Don’t misunderstand what I’m saying about running. I’m not a world-class runner and have never actually won a race, but that’s not the point. I’ve finished numerous races, and what I’m finding is you can’t finish what you don’t start. That’s why running has so many life lessons for me.

While My Faith Has Made Me ______ is not about running, it’s about believing in God and that God can do anything He pleases and has unlimited power to help with those that seek Him in faith (Psalms 115:3). It’s about my faith in a person that wants to do more for me and through me than I ever thought possible. While this was a period in my life when I was not living for God, He was working in me in ways that were exceedingly and abundantly above what I could or did ask. I look back now and see how God used this very event to inspire a book titled My Faith Has Made Me _________.

2

A Knee for the Ages

There is another part