I was about the last one of our crew to arrive at New Life and Tim ushered us in just as the Praise and Worship services were getting underway. They have a great Praise and Worship team and from the moment they started you could feel the presence of the Holy Spirit this morning.
As I was getting used to the service I noticed the guy in front of me on the first row had no right hand. Something clicked in my memory about how I thought I had overhead my wife and Tim say something about their Pastor, Bro Reliford being the Pastor at Atwood Chapel in Casey County years ago. That Bro Reliford had actually baptized her when she accepted Christ as her Saviour. The “wierd” thing was that only yesterday I had seen the picture of her being baptized in 1974 that was printed in the Casey paper. For some reason the picture was laying there on the dresser in our bedroom. I have no idea why it was there as I hadn’t seen it out in a lot of years.
While I was contemplating on that, a gentleman came in and joined the Praise and Worship team after a few songs. I recognized him as the man who sung at David Ballard’s funeral almost 2 years ago in Russell Springs. He sang a song that was titled “We Will Ride”. I was so moved by that song at the funeral, that I came home and found three different versions of it. My intention was to use the song as a backdrop for a video segment about our chapter. I have worked on it off and on but still haven’t made it happen. I started thinking about how I could get to him somehow to ask him if he could sing it this morning.
About this time, a young lady in a wheelchair came forward. It seems as if she has a lot of trouble breathing except when she is singing for the Lord. This morning she sang a duet and did a great job. The song she sang was “I Can Only Imagine”. That song is very personal to some of our members and as they sang it, I was filled with quite a bit of emotion also.
It struck me that here I was in a church I had never been in before and that in front of me was a Pastor I had never met. And he had brought a message way back in 1974 that allowed the Holy Spirit to move on a young high school girl and become saved. How she and I got married and that she has been the rock of spirituality for our marriage. And that just yesterday we celebrated 34 years of being married. Thats when I think I kinda lost it. I am glad I had the sunglasses on at that time. The emotion was pretty strong for me.
But God wasn’t done just yet it seems. About this time Bro Reliford gets up and asks Tim to come up and let the church know a bit about CMA and our ministry. Tim of course gets up as a good military man will and then in perfect military fashion, he decides to pass the buck on to someone else. That someone else happened to be me!!
As I took the mike after being thrown under the bus, I knew that God was providing me a way to get to the singer as well as to Bro Reliford. I quickly asked Bro Reliford if he had served at Atwood’s Chapel in Casey County and he looked at me a little weird and said that he had. I then turned to the singer and asked if he had sung at David Ballard’s funeral and he said that he did. I was on the hook now I guess. In a way I was hoping that they both would have said no and that I was mistaken on both counts. I asked the singer if he could do the song that he sang at the funeral. I was so pleased when he said he and the band would try.
As I briefly told the congregation about CMA and our chapter I was trying to keep some composure, but I think I blew it when I tried to tell Bro Reliford how much affect he had on my life by being at a small country church a lot of years ago. About all I could do was to hug him, thank him and sit down out of the way.
We got to hear again one of my favorite contemporary Christian songs that I have heard and I was truly blessed. Bro Reliford brought a good worship message and I knew I had recieved another great blessing today.
Thanks so much Tim and Jodie for inviting us to be a part of your church family. I hope everyone was as blessed as I was today.
Richard Durham
2010 President
Vision Riders Chapter 1038
Christian Motorcyclists Association