Strength through Fellowship

         Being new to Christianity, I wanted to know everything. I joined a bible study group and through that I learned a lot. I was a smoker at the time and within a few short weeks I quit smoking. I became very active in the church I was attending and joined every group including the youth group which was very interesting. The young teenagers showed a great deal of love for God. They were quite active in the community and did a number of activities.  To me everything in my life had changed for the better.

             Over the following six months, I found myself becoming gentler toward others and doing so much in the church helped me to do that. The fellowships through Belmont Presbyterian Church was phenomenal and believe you - me; the people loved God more than I ever knew was possible. Whenever I walked in church, I could actually feel the ‘Love of God’ and therefore my soul felt every ounce of love.

             I remember our Pastor who seemed the most intriguing, he was not interested in how much money you had only your soul. I will call him Pastor Dave and he taught me so much of the reasons Jesus had died for my sins. Pastor Dave was married and also had three daughters. His wife Georgia also showed the love of God from within her very soul. Their girls ranged in ages twelve through nineteen and their love for God seemed just like their parents and involved with community services as well.

             I had moved to Virginia in 1977 and through some very hard falls and being at one of the lowest points of my life. Help and encouragement came from a Christian. I had never wanted anything to do with God in all my life and as a matter of fact I used to say and I quote, “I believe in God but I don’t live his life, so to Hell with that.” I could have never been more wrong in my life than that. Through this person and God’s Love I became a Christian.

            My newness to Christianity soon changed due to unforeseen instances. My father passed away and then my sister was killed in a car accident. I ended up moving back to Pennsylvania in 1981 I think it was and found myself in a whole different environment. I went to the churches here and to my horror there just did not seem to be the same fellowship or love like I had found in Virginia. To me this was a mind shattering blow and as time passed I found myself lacking again. I mean I still had love for God and my ways were still the same as I did not return to my cursing ways.

During the next ten years things really changed, I ended up not going to church at all and in the meantime I began to sink further and further into a rut. The ‘Joy’ I found seemed to dissipate over the years and believe me, it was hard. I retried the Catholic Church but that even ended up a fluke; oh I mean I found some very nice people but nothing like I had known.

             I began reminiscing about the wonderful people I had met while in Virginia and all the fellowship I had there. I also remembered a passage of scripture I had learned. The verse was Hebrews10:25 KJV and it goes like this,

             ‘Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.’

            Now to me I seemed to have been told that this meant meeting in Church but as I thought about it, I found a whole different meaning, ‘Fellowship’ without it we have no strengthening and boy do we all need it.

             I began thinking about how fellowship plays a giant role in our lives as Christians. I thought of it like this, you take a bushel of apples and leave one rotten one in the bushel and do nothing to take care of it. The next thing you know, all the apples have gone bad.’  Here I was down again and even my faith seemed to be diminishing. I had become disabled and life sure was getting harder to enjoy. Without fellowship one tends to lose sight of the reason Christ died for us and we lose our own self-worth. We also begin to turn back to the worldly ways and slowly rot away.

             I have found new strength through writing and fellowship with other Christians through the internet. I have also found a church with fellowship and believe me that make’s all the difference in the world and my sanity. If you find yourself in the same situation seek a place or church where fellowship is important and believe me it is.

             Remember these words,

           ‘Strength through Fellowship will guide you back to God and help keep your Christianity in perspective.’

 

 

 

Wondering

By

Milton Niles

 'Who is ‘God’

 

Have you ever wondered just who ‘God’ is? I sure have and wanted to find out everything I could about Him. After many years of being about as sinful as ever and doing everything wrong, I believe I have an answer. I don’t know about you but I have been close to death on a few occasions, pulled through it all and still did it my way. I never wanted to hear anything about ‘God’ or have anything to do with Him. I now realize after many, many years that I had ‘God’ all along in my life.

Take and look out your window sometime or look up toward the heavens. Do not look with just your eyes nor your heart but also your mind. Go to a hospital and visit the Maternity floor, you will see God there also. Look upon the trees, the land and the seas. What do you see? ‘God’ He is everywhere; He is life, forgiveness, beauty and everything else there is. In essence, ‘God’ is pure life, He is your lifeline, He is your care giver, your doctor, your spouse and your children.

 Now there may be some who will say that ‘God’ does not exist, boy have they made a big mistake. They may even say that we all came from Apes and that life began with the big bang which scientist have said, that too, is wrong. Just stop and think about it and ask yourself this question. ‘Why are there still Apes upon this beautiful planet?’ As far as the quote, unquote ‘Big Bang’ goes that just happened to be ‘God’ clapping his hands together as He created you and me.

 I will also say something else and that is ‘God’ is complete total and unconditional Love. How many of us can say that with honesty, I know I sure can’t. ‘God’ is also our Father, Mother, Brother and Sister for He is life within life. ‘God is also our next door neighbor, the lost child down the street, those that are hungry, homeless, lonely and even those that have been forsaken by you and I.

 To give you a sense of how I realized all of this I must share with you a couple of my own life experiences.

  I happened to have been about eight years old when was instructed by my mother to chop some wood. While chopping, I got the ax stuck in a piece of the wood. Circumstances at the time meant that I had no other choice but to finish chopping up the wood. Angrily, I grabbed a hammer and went to work on the ax, trying to free it from the piece of wood. The next thing I knew, a piece of metal from either the ax or the hammer flew right into my left eye. Now that alone might have ended my life but it did not. I did however have to have the eye removed.

 Another time when I was about fifteen or sixteen, I am not quite sure which it was, but I lay for five days with a ruptured appendix. I lost around thirty pounds in those five days. When I was finally taken to the doctors, they ended up rushing me into surgery. After surgery, there I was with tubes everywhere and in so much pain I can not even describe it. Out of the hospital with a big hole in my side for drainage, I could only walk very slowly. As a matter of fact, a turtle could have beaten me across the street. To tell you the truth, I should have been dead because the infection had gone through my whole body. ‘God’ had to be there even at that time and kept me safe.

 I could tell you much more but the point I am trying to make is this, no matter who you are or what you have done ‘God’ is right there beside you. So if you or someone you know asks the question, ‘Who is ‘God’, tell them He is everything there is and without Him there is nothing what so ever.

 God is the maker of all things, including the heavens or as we say ‘The Universe’ Believe me one day every soul will know exactly who God is.

We have all heard the saying, ‘You never miss the water until the well runs dry.’ I am here to tell you that it is so true. This saying also goes with life in general and in the work place. I remember the times while working when I would keep saying I need a vacation away from work. After so many years of working one tends to get tired of the same old rigamarow. I myself have said it so many times it is not even funny.

 It was not until I became disabled that I began to realize just how much I miss working. To me the old saying actually became real to me as I had to sit at home and do nothing. Oh, it was okay to start but after awhile it got to miserable and I found myself needing to be doing something. I already went through two bone graphs to my spine and found myself getting lazier and lazier with depression setting in like no tomorrow.

 In nineteen seventy-seven I fell at work injuring my spine, I was a sergeant in the security field and knew my job quite well. After receiving workman’s comp for a couple of months I decided to go back to work but the doctors said I could not. Right then and there I made the biggest mistake and moved out of town. I gave up the workman’s comp and found a job in Virginia. Moving back to Pennsylvania in nineteen eighty-one after two family tragedies.

 I found a job making bullet-proof vests for the military and did make a good wage. However I could not bring myself to acknowledge that my spine was getting worse. Before I knew it I could hardly even walk, as a matter of fact I walked like a ninety year old man and lost my job. Being so bull-headed I still did not want to go to a doctor but ended up going about six months later. I was diagnosed with narrowing of the spine and a degenerative bone disease in which I needed surgery.

 I started receiving Social Security Disability and after the first surgery in which they did a bone graph, I felt like a new man with the energy to go along with it. This in itself became a huge problem because I began to do things I surely was not supposed to do. Needless to say I busted the fusion and ended up having to go through another surgery. Believe me that Macho stuff is not worth the agony as I almost died in the second surgery. This had all taken place between 1985 and 1987.

 After about five years I lost most of my faith and began to wonder why I was in this position. I wanted to go back to work and could not which made things even harder to comprehend. I also thought about all the times I wanted a break from work and wanted to just lay around and be lazy. Well it happened so here I am in the opposite and wanting to work so I began to realize the saying about never missing the water only I was missing work. The moral of this story is work and believe me one would not want to be in that position…..Ever.

A Sinner's Prayer

Milton Niles

One day, as I sat on my couch, an idea for a movie played over and over in my mind. It was so compelling, I knew I had to try and write it down on paper. I knew nothing about writing; actually, I never had any interest in it at all. I had only an eighth-grade education and knew nothing about punctuation or how to start writing anything. Still, the story was in my mind, so I wrote a few paragraphs to see how it looked. It didn’t look good to me at all.

A week later, the movie idea was still going through my mind. A very good friend stopped by, so I asked if he knew anything about writing a story. I knew he went to college and was a computer expert but as far as writing, I was unsure. Gary said he did not know much about writing but if I wanted him to, he would help me. Together, we began writing The Remaking of Earth.

Over the next three months, we wrote and wrote, but when we looked at it, it just did not seem right. Not having a computer or typewriter, it seemed very difficult to keep writing by hand. I managed to purchase a typewriter but not knowing how to type made it more difficult. I could not afford all the eraser ribbons and I was making more mistakes than you can imagine.

Just when everything seemed to be at a standstill, my brother showed up at my apartment and said he had a computer he would sell me for a hundred dollars. I told him I had no money to buy it. He asked if I had anything to trade for it. The only thing I had worth that much was my TV. So that’s what I did: I traded my TV for this computer.

Now, I knew nothing about computers either, but at least I would not have to worry about eraser ribbons. I called Gary and told him I had a computer so he came over to check it out. Lo and behold, it was not a computer but a word processing machine. However, we could at least write with it and it seemed to work well.

We completed four chapters when the machine quit working. Here we were at a dead stop again, but God seemed to have a plan and wanted this story written. You may ask how I knew it was God and not just my overactive mind. I will tell it just as I learned it some time ago.

I was raised in a very abusive family – not only physical abuse but mental and sexual as well. I grew up filled with hate and bitterness. I did everything the way I wanted and believe me it was horrible. I drank a lot, cursed and did whatever I saw fit to do. I worked at a diner and I was trustworthy but when I got out of work, I went straight to the bar. I would be in the bars until they closed, went home, slept for an hour and went to work.

I had my own apartment so it did not matter what time I came in or left. I did not have to answer to anyone and that was the way I wanted it. Through the next 30 years, I lived with women, married a couple of them but never really loved any of them. I had too much hate within me; besides, I knew nothing about love. Oh I know, this might sound like a horrible story but believe me, you will understand when I am done. God has a way of changing a person’s life and He sure did mine.

In 1977, I married someone just because I was told I could not do it. Right after I got married, this woman went home with me and never cleaned the house or anything. I ended up with roaches all over the place. I happened to be at a friend’s house one evening; I will call him James. He was a drunk just like me only, except that while I drank just to be noticed, he was an alcoholic. His wife, Donna, was cute and she was tired of the way she was being treated by James.

One night I went to James’s house but he had left for the weekend. One thing led to another and the next thing I knew his wife and I were making out. That did not bother me, so we started a relationship on the side. I was on worker’s compensation at the time, and after two or three weeks of this relationship, I happened to get a comp check for about $300. I went to the bar and began drinking. I was about as drunk as anyone could be when I went to James’s house and asked Donna if she wanted to get out of there. She said she did, so we took off and headed south. We ended up in Roanoke, Virginia where I got a job. We found an apartment right away and that was great, or so I thought.

After a few months, things changed. There was no more work and no money coming in. Things seemed to only get worse; the next thing I knew, we were being evicted. We had no food and I had already sold my car. The day came when we had to be out but just at that moment, the lady across the street asked me to give her a hand carrying out some garbage. I did. She asked why my stuff was on the street and I told her. She told me if I would take care of her place, she would give us an apartment, so I accepted.

She was a Christian lady and full of God’s love. I will call this lady Madelyn. Now, she went out and bought us all kinds of groceries and became a very close friend. Madelyn talked about God and how God loved me and all souls. She invited us to go with her to church one Sunday and I did out of respect for her. This was the beginning of my life being changed.

I had been baptized when I was about 15 into the Catholic faith but did not believe it at all. As a matter of fact, I used it to get out of the house and away from my parents at the time. But over the next year after meeting Madelyn, I became a new person. I started reading the Bible but for one reason or another, I just did not understand a thing. I wanted to understand but the understanding just kept eluding me. One day I happened to say a prayer and asked God for his Divine help. This is the prayer I said that day:

Eternal Father, thank You for the life You have given me. you know I am a wicked person and a sinner. I ask Your forgiveness for the transgressions I have committed against You. Forgive me for not loving You with all my heart, soul and mind. For taking Your Holy name in vain. For not keeping the Sabbath holy. For not honoring my father and mother. For having worshipped graven images, such as TV, money and other things of this world. For having committed adultery and fornication. For the things I have stolen. For the lies I have spoken to my fellow man. For coveting my neighbor’s property. I beg Your forgiveness.

I also ask, Heavenly Father, that You allow Your Holy Spirit to come upon me that I might understand Your Scriptures. I pray for truth in my life, not man’s truth but Yours, Dear Lord. I ask these things in the name of Your only begotten Son, Jesus Christ. Amen.

I was about as astonished as can be – I received an answer instantly. I began to understand things as never before.

The same year, I was called back home where my father lay dying in the hospital. Returning to upstate New York was difficult but needed to be done. Dad passed away and I returned to Virginia. It was just one year after my dad died that I received a call telling me my sister had been killed in an accident. Needless to say, I packed all of our stuff and moved back to Pennsylvania. It was 1981. I got a job as a Security Guard. I tried going to church there but the people were so much different than what I expected.

Without fellowship, I seemed to lose what I had found. I fell flat on my face, so to speak. I did not give up entirely and still loved God. Though I stopped going to church, I still maintained my prayers. Life sure had brought me down to the pits and I knew I needed to get a hold on things. Evidently the time was not right for the Maker to mold me to His specifications, because in 1985, I became diagnosed with a degenerative bone disease in my spine. I had to go on Social Security Disability. After two bone graphs to my spine, I became depressed and grew very low in my faith in God. The next seven years were tough.

Now, back to where I started, about the story Gary and I were writing. I knew it was God, because He had allowed me to get to the lowest point of my life and knew my thoughts and my heart. He then started lifting me up from the very depths of depression.

Gary was offered a job in Tennessee and moved there, so the story got put on hold. I managed to get a real computer and started contacting Gary through the Internet. We started working on the book again. In the meantime, Donna and I were divorced in 1997 and in 1999 I remarried a wonderful girl, Diane, I had known for a long time. This was a love that could only come from God. Diane stood behind me on my writing and encouraged me like no tomorrow.

In 2002, Gary and I finished writing The Remaking Of Earth, but we were unable to get it published. A year later, however, I found a Print On Demand publishing company. For a nominal fee, they would put our book into print.

Now, this is all true and I know God is the true Author of our story, because we could never have done it on our own. I also know from within my own heart that I would never have tried writing or gone anywhere in my faith had it not been for our Heavenly Father loving me and guiding me all the way. It was God who showed Me what love was and how I belonged to Him.

I tell you, my friends, if you are lost and have not found peace in your life then call on God, your Heavenly Father. Prayer is the most powerful tool we have today. Believe me, I know. My whole life changed because of prayer. I have been one of the worst sinners in the world. If God can love Me and prayers can help me, then I know it will also work for you. God loves each and every one of you and so do I. Just remember, Love is the foundation of all life and Prayer is the most powerful tool we have.

© 2006 by Milton Niles

 

            The day before Father’s Day, I grilled hotdogs and Cheeseburgers. Made Potato Salad and had everything ready for when my wife Diane came home from working at the local Hospital. Diane is a Certified Nurse’s Aid and going to college to become a Registered Nurse. She told me that the next day she would be doing all the cooking and I did not have to do anything but flop around. That seemed wonderful to me at the time because I am the one who did all the cooking and cleaning.

             Once we had eaten our dinner we went to see a movie at the theater. I enjoyed going to the movies with her and always had my popcorn, while Diane got her snowcaps. It was a special thing we had done ever since we were married. Little did I know at that time that things were about to get very painful.  We returned home about nine-thirty that evening and I sort of had a funny feeling in my stomach. I did not say anything to my wife at the time and maybe I should have.

             Father’s day morning Diane brought me in a cup of coffee, sat on the bed next to me and said “Happy Father’s Day honey.”

             “Thank you Baby, what a beautiful morning and you look wonderful.”

 I drank my coffee, got up and went into the living room where she was and kissed her. Today is the day I get to relax and be pampered or so I thought. We sat around, watched Television and just played lazy. Not a care in the world, except for each other and of course our animals, two dogs and a cat. God had blessed me with the greatest woman in the world and He knew just how much we loved one another.

             I now had a deep ache inside and felt a little nauseous as if I were going to vomit. All of a sudden I had a bad case of diarrhea and felt like my insides were going to explode. Within no time I was running back and forth to the bathroom. No matter what I ate or drank, it seemed to go right through me. Not wanting to say anything to Diane, I kept things to myself for the time being.

             About three o’clock that afternoon, she went and stated the grill and began cooking my Father’s Day Dinner. When everything had been prepared, we sat down to eat. I ate about a quarter of a hamburger and could not eat anything else. I felt bad but just could not eat at all. Diane seemed quite disappointed, so I explained to her that I just did not feel good at all. She wanted me to go to the Emergency Room at the hospital and get checked. I said no because I hated the Emergency Room and as a matter of fact hated Hospitals altogether.

               Over the years I had had many, many operations and sure had my fill of hospitals. I had also had many bad experiences with Emergency Rooms. They were always interested in paperwork and not the patient. May times I suffered through bad headaches and other illnesses because I did not want to just sit and wait for a doctor to see me in the E.R.

             Monday morning Diane called my doctors to see if they would be able to check me out right away but my doctors was on vacation or something. She did however get me in to see one of the other doctors. As we sat in his office and waited for him to see me, I felt even worse. As soon as the doctor came in he ordered a cat scan. Lo and behold my intestines were completely inflamed and I was passing blood like no tomorrow. I was admitted instantly and they started me on IV’s. The next day they did a colonoscopy and took biopsies. Come to find out I had food poisoning and caught a bacteria called Camplobacter jajunie or something like that.

 After three day I came home and thought that was the end of it. They had put me on a strong anti-biotic. After one day being home I had to be readmitted because I was still passing blood. They started the IV’s again and I was not allowed to eat anything. After a couple of days I began to feel much better. I finally got to come home four days later.

             The whole nursing staff was fantastic and I could not have been treated any better. I found that on the floor were I was put was the cancer floor but believe me one would not have known it by the way the nurses and the aids were fantastic. They were more like Florence Nightingale and really cared about their patients. God sure blessed me with their care and I am surly thankful not only to God but to them as well.

 

God bless these wonderful people who care so much!

 Laying here in this bed, eye wide open and can’t sleep. Like so many times before it is almost morning and no rest. The sun is coming up over the horizon, pretty soon they will come for me, maybe I should have ate something at midnight then they could not do anything to me. Oh well it will all be over soon anyway and then I will rest. I know they think they are doing it with the best of intentions but that does not help my thoughts.

             My palms are wet from sweat; my heart is racing as if it were in the Daytona 500 and trying to take the checkered flag. My head is throbbing and I feel every beat of my heart in the back of my head. I know, maybe they won’t do anything because of my head and my heart. No that won’t stop them, it never has they will do what they want to do anyway. Fear has gripped me yet again as I think of what is to take place. I just get so tired of all of this and just want things right again.

             Here they come; it is just before eight o’clock in the morning. That is strange though, usually they don’t start until late, they always make me wait and yet I hear them coming. Yep, there is the Nurse but wait why are the doctors coming? Maybe they are going to postpone the surgery; that would be great. Oh no! It’s not for me, I had not even thought about the patient lying in the bed next to me. I had been to busy thinking about my own troubles not someone else. This was my time to feel sorry for myself not another patient; I am the one suffering all this agony; not him.

             I sat up and listened as the doctors went to work on the man in the next bed. He screamed in pain and my heart skipped a beat or two. What in the world are they doing to him I wondered. More screams, over and over. I heard the Nurse say, it will be over soon Mr. Hunkle, the stitches will be out soon. I knew at that point that he must have had surgery before I had been admitted. I began to feel the pain every time the Doctor removed a stitch, here I was feeling someone else’s pain and I could not understand that.

It was all over and the Doctors left the room. The Nurse pulled the curtain back and left.

             Once every one had gone, I turned to look at the man and to my surprise he was only about 19 year old. I asked him what they had done, he replied with the most gruesome story I have ever heard. Tom told me he had been playing with some friends and as he jumped over a fence he landed on a big spike that was in a board. The spike went right through his scrotum and up through his testicles. Tom’s privates had been ripped wide open and it took over a hundred and some stitches to close the wounds.

              As for myself I had had about twenty five or thirty surgeries prior to this one and feeling pity for myself.

  I was only fourteen or fifteen at the time but right then and there, I had a change of heart. I began to think about another human being who happened to be worse off than I was. I never forgot the lesson I learned that day. A person can always look over their shoulder and see someone who is in far worse condition. My feeling sorry for myself ended that day. Do I still get scared when it comes to having surgery? Yes by all means it is still the same way. The sweaty palms, the racing heart and the pounding of my head but I look at it differently than I did back then.

             To this day I have had over sixty operations on my eye where they have tried to reconstruct an eye socket so I could have an artificial eye. You see I lost my eye when I was eight years old and the socket ended up very deformed. I don’t worry about the deformity anymore and it does not bother me if anyone notices. God made me the way I am and he also showed me the truth about life. So remember these words.

             Look over your shoulder when you are in a self pity situation and I guarantee you will see someone who is far worse than you are.

This is a story I did for my weekly challenge on Faithwriters. I pray you might enjoy reading it.

 

When all else Fails

James began to cry as he sat by his beloved wife of fifty years. The doctors said there was no cure for Mary’s brain tumor. They determined that the size and location made surgery impossible. She will not last more than a couple of days, if that. James did not know what to do. He knew he could not live without his Mary.

James was only sixteen when they met, Mary was only fourteen. He courted her for two years then asked her father if he would give them his blessing in marriage. The following June they were married. He worked in a stone quarry from sunup to sundown every day for forty years. He and Mary had four children, John, Andrew, Rebecca, and Steven.
All their children had married except for Steven. He was a minister who traveled the world preaching the gospel of the Lord.

  Their daughter Rebecca returned home to help take care of her mother after she learned of her illness. She had just left to go home and get something to eat. Her husband had no other choice but to remain back in Iowa to care for their children and to continue working.

  Andrew served in the Navy. He was out to sea where he would be unable to get home for another month or two. John lived in Pennsylvania with his wife Emily. They also have a son, James, named after his grandfather. They would be coming in on the three am flight but would not get there until around five o’clock in the morning.
James’s thoughts returned as he felt a hand on his shoulder. Turning, he saw a young man standing beside him. He asked if he could help him. The man said no but he was there to pray with him.

“Did Pastor Robert send you here young man?”

“No sir, my father sent me here to be with you and Mary and to pray with you.”

With that, the two men kneeled in prayer. This is their prayer.
‘Heavenly Father, we kneel here before you tonight giving you thanks for all of your blessings. We also ask dear Father that you might allow our beloved Mary to remain here yet awhile longer. We know that with you all hope is ours for the asking. We humbly pray for strength and guidance in our grief. With you all things are possible.’

After praying, James opened his eyes. To his surprise, the young man was gone. When the nurse came into the room, he asked her where the young man went. The nurse told him not a single person had been there since his daughter left twenty minutes before. James thought he must be going nuts, he was sure there had been someone there with him.
Rebecca returned about an hour later. When the doctor came in to check on Mary, he noticed her breathing seemed to be more normal. While he was touching her, she awoke, said she was hungry and wanted to go home. The doctor told her she needed to stay and to rest.

“There is nothing wrong with me I am going home!”
She jumped out of the bed, told James to come so she could get supper ready. Mary seemed quite normal so the doctors told her to let them examine her before she left.

  When they did a MRI they were astonished. There was no sign of a tumor ever having been there. James knew at that moment that God had sent an angel to be with him and Mary.

When all else fails, God in his compassion gives life a renewal. When faith is there, hope never fails.

 

I would like to tell a story to all of you who believe in God. I was only eight years old when I lost my left eye from chopping wood. Through the years I have had over sixty operations where the doctors have tried to reconstruct the eye socket. Anyone who has had surgery knows that today with the anesthesia you blink your eyes and you are either in the recovery room or back in your room. With Sodium Pentothal it is impossible to dream as it is with most of the anesthesias used today.

In nineteen eighty to my horror I had to have surgery again because of an infection in my eye socket. I really did not want to have surgery again, I was sick and tired of having them. The doctor said if I did not have the surgery then the infection would go into my good eye so here I was again in the hospital.

I was new to Christianity and so my faith was not quite what it should be. I was trying to change my life and even had a small Gospel singing group called ‘The Originals’. We sang in churches and other places. Anyway my girlfriend and the whole group were there in the hospital the day of surgery. I know this may sound crazy but is the truth. I am sure everyone has heard of the movie, ‘Lilies of the Field’ starring Sidney Poitier. The song he sang was one of my favorites so I told all that were there with me that if I did not make it through the surgery that I would like them to sing Lilies of the Field.

Once into the surgery I began to dream or at least that is what I call it. I dreamt that I was back in my room and everyone there was crying and singing ‘Lilies of the Field’. I am sure everyone who has heard this song knows how many ‘Amen’s’ are in that song. Now every time the word ‘Amen’ was said, my head literally exploded. I am here to tell you that this seemed to last until eternity and then just as suddenly, it was all over. I was back in my room and everything had gone great. I didn’t understand how or why this had happened until much later.

I was reading the Bible one day and to my surprise I read a passage or at least I thought I read it. It said something to the fact that either Peter or Paul allowed someone to visit Satan for a short period of time that he learn not to blaspheme. To this day I have been unable to find that passage so whether God had spoken to me or what I can not say. The one thing I knew at the time was I realized that ‘Hell’ could be  part of living with the worst pain anyone has ever been through and have to live that pain for all eternity. For me the pain I felt as my entire head was exploding was the worst I had ever felt in my life. I have had plenty of pain since childhood but nothing compared to what I had experienced during that surgery.

I have had numerous surgeries since and each time was like normal, you go in, blink you eyes and your out. So whether it was God showing me or if I really read it, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I never want to go to ‘Hell and experience that pain again. I have since tried very hard to change my ways. Not that I don’t mess up because I do but this time I know God is there to help me clean up my messes. God loves each and every one of us and forgives us with unconditional love.

 

Praise God in the highest

Milton Niles

At last I have the answer to the verse I have been talking about.

Thanks to Jerry

KJV 1st Timothy1:20

When things go wrong

When everything seems to go wrong in our lives, remember that God ‘Our Father’ is always there to guide us through those times. In some point in our lives we seem to think that no one cares and God has left us on our own. God does not leave us for one minute; he only lets us get so far and then brings us back to him. God never forsakes us at any time.

            A friend of mine once told me,’ “You must surrender to the Lord”. I believe that if we first give our heart, then our mind and finally give our soul over to God then we will have all the answers we need to survive in this world. There are enough problems in the world today and it seems that we forget that God is always there. I know I have felt that way a good many times and it always seems that when I am at my wits end, God always provides a way of returning.

            We may want things in our time or right then and there but God knows exactly what we need and when to allow us to have it. If we allow God to take complete control of our lives, then we will receive what we need even before asking. I know, I have been there on many occasions and it really does work when we give God the chance to guide us. This is not always easy for some of us but it does work.  

A Shame

I t is a shame that Easter is not celebrated like it used to be. I can remember when Christmas and Easter were here, there would always be movies on television and it sure seemed great to watch. It seems that Easter it self is not even considered a holiday anymore in a lot of places. Have they forgotten that our Lord gave his life for them also? I may be a little old fashioned but it seems to me that God should be first and not society. We Christians need to take back our schools and our right to have God listed in every building in the world. Maybe this may sound wrong to some but I am sure there are quite a number of Christians who think this way also. Something needs to be done and it looks like all Christians need to pull together and get it done. If one person can stop prayers in school then we as Christians should be able to get it back and let the world know we will not go quietly into that good night without a fight and that we are not going to stand still for The Resurrection to be put aside. So therefore if we don’t who will? I say lets get Christ back into Christmas and The Resurrection back into society where it belongs. If I offend anyone, please forgive me but I know I would like to see God worshipped by all people and not ignored the way he is today.

He is Alive

Today we celebrate the Resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Christ defeated death and through him we all have a way back to the Father.

Jesus took upon himself the sins of the world even though he knew ‘No Sin’.

I am a sinner and I thank God for his son Jesus who paid the ultimate price.

 For my sins, he gave his life. Praise God in the Highest!

For the wages of sin is death: but the gift God is Eternal Life through

Jesus Christ our Lord. (KJV)

 

Good Friday

Today is the day we celebrate the crucifixion of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

In Roman’s5:8 it say that, ‘But God commended his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. (KJV) I wonder how many of us could go through the horrific things Jesus did? How many of us would have the courage to give our life for a whole world? How many of us have that great of love for others? God’s unconditional Love is the most complete love there is or ever will be.

            I have asked these questions of myself many, many times and I still come up with the same answer. ‘NO’ I do love most people but I also know within my own heart I would not have that kind of love or strength to do it on my own. I also ‘Know’ that ‘The Holy Spirit’ could give me strength but to do it on my own, I could not. Today I ‘THANK GOD’ for his love and for Jesus Christ who not only saved me but gave his life for each and every one of us. It is my prayer there every one of you have a beautiful holiday and remember, if it were not for God and his only begotten son Jesus Christ, We would not be saved and would not be celebrating.

 

Milton A. Niles

I am sorry I have not been here for a few days. I have been quite busy getting things ready for my book signing tomorrow night at our local Library. God has blessed me greatly and I know in my heart that he has also blessed me with great friends here on Bravenet.

It is wonderful that God can take an old sinner like me and change my life. God does just that, he takes the sinner and transforms him into a new soul. Life had not always been easy for me but since finding God or rather God finding me, I have become a new person. It was never my idea to write or anything of the sort. Then one day as I was laying on my couch, this movie played over and over in my mind. I did not understand but I could not get it off my mind. I decided to write down what I was seeing but at the time I knew nothing about writing. I asked my best friend Gary Zello to help me with it. I told Gary I would also name him as a co-author.

Now Gary had never written before either but together we started. We had worked on ‘The Remaking of Earth’ for two or three months when Gary moved to Tennessee for a better paying job. It took a long time for us to get together via the net and start writing again. He later moved to Indiana where he still resides today.  To make a long story short, by 2003 we had finally completed our book.

As most of you know I started my journal here on Bravenet back in the beginning of February and through this I have met wonderful people, ‘THANK GOD’. Now it seems that God has taken over the promotion of ‘The Remaking of earth.’ He sent me Storm who has been a fantastic help in my setting up my journal, since starting, God has done so much with getting his story out there into the world. I say his story because I believe with all my heart and soul that God planted a seed in me to do his writing. I know that this book is a work of fiction but one needs only to believe and they will see that maybe, just maybe it is not so far out of God’s realm.

Thank each and everyone of you for your patience.

Milton Niles

 

    

The glow of love is quite unique. When a man sees that special 

'Glow', In a woman's face, then you can bet he has found the 

right one and has also found his soul mate.True love is one of 

the rarest gifts, from God there is in the universe. 

In today's society, we see more and more divorces. 

Both men and women have lost that special talent 

God gave them for finding each other. In this life we have 

but a few short years to find the one true love we had in heaven

            Since coming to Bravenet, I have met wonderful Christian people. I would like to thank Storm for her help in my starting my journal. God has blessed me by her devotion to God and to friendship. It is hard to find true friends who believe in God and yet have struggles like I do. Another close friend that I met here is P.J. and through her friendship I find even more faith in God our father. There is Rev. Handy which I also have spoken with, and found yet another friend. I would also like to recognize the following people who I would like to get to know and talk to. There is Alice and Bob, Corena, Syd, Ladywhitespirit, Dr. Dennis Callahan, Shelli, and Hailey.  Fellowship is the most powerful tool we have to maintain our faith. God blessed us with not only his son Jesus Christ, The Holy Spirit, but each other as well. Thank You Heavenly Father for your Love and for our friends that help keep our faith in you ‘STRONG’.

 

Milton Niles

 

 

 

 

Have you ever wondered what happens to some people when their faith begins to fail and then get another chance?  The Remaking of Earth is the first in a series that takes the reader on a wonderful and thoughtful journey into the world of second chances and positive change.  It is available to everyone who will believe.  Niles and Zello have written a new view of an age-old version of faith, courage to go beyond the normal, and continue when even the very closest of friends think the characters are just plain crazy. 

              This is an book that you will want to read straight through, again and again. 

Click on your links above for Amazon.com to purchase your copy today.  The first chapter is available for your review on the site. 

Let us know your feedback, and watch for The Vapor, the second in the series. 

Happy reading, and believe ….

 

Milton Niles

 

 

 

 

As we walk through life, we find many ups and downs. We are always looking for the better things in life and sometimes we find them, sometimes we don’t. It seems that as long as we get what we want in life, we give credit to God but when everything goes wrong, we tend to blame God. Is it not strange how we get into this way of thinking? I grew up in an abusive home and didn’t really know God until I was in my late forties. I had heard about God but that was the extent of it.

Whether we know it or not, God is always there but it is us that don’t know he is there. I never thought about it until I came to God but when I was about fifteen, I lay five days with ruptured appendix, I should have died but God was there right along protecting me. The doctor rushed me into the hospital and they did emergency surgery. I woke up with tubes everywhere. When I came home I still had a hole in my side because of drainage. I could hardly walk and a turtle would have walked faster. So no matter what we think God is always there with us whether we want to accept it or not.   

Milton Niles 

 

 

Mysterious ways

    You have heard the saying that ‘God works in mysterious ways'. I am here to tell you that this saying is very true. As some of you know a friend of mine and I wrote a book called, ‘The Remaking of Earth”. I recently had a very disappointing thing happen. I had talked to Tate Publishing Company and at the time Mr. Tate told me that he would look at our book, which was already in print and for sale via Amazon and Book surge. To make a long story short, I received a contract in the mail at which my friends name was not on and they were asking for four-thousand dollars. Mr. Tate himself had told me that if they could get commitments for the book then they would redo ‘The Remaking of Earth’ which they in return would send a contract and pay us up to twenty thousand up front and do all the marketing, editing, ect. When I called and finally got hold of Mr. Tate to tell him about the mistakes in the contract, he told me that he could only get commitments for three thousand books. This meant that they could not accept our book.

       I was distraught and wanted to quit writing altogether. I talked to my wife, Diane and to a friend I had met here on bravenet. I don’t think she would mind me saying her name.  That friend is Storm and along with my wife they finally convinced me to continue writing because it was God’s will. Just because I had such a disappointment it did not mean that God wanted me to stop writing.

     Thanks to God and to these wonderful people I did not stop writing and I am now writing the second book. Anyway, I was sitting here working on the computer and chatting with another friend when the phone rang. It was our local public library calling and they asked me to do a book signing here in my home town on April sixth. I said I would be more than happy to. Now this may sound like it is no big deal but to me it is. I now realize that God will promote his story in his time and not mine. I have never asked the library to have a signing for me at anytime, so therefore it had to be God’s will. So you see, God does work in mysterious ways even today. I now believe it more than ever. I ask all who read this to please pray for me and if you can, go to the links to Amazon or Booksurge and purchase a copy for yourself. You will not be disappointed. Our book contains no violence, cursing, or hatred what-so-ever.  

I had a dream a few years ago and you might be surprised by reading this story. I dreamed I was standing upon a mountain top, when suddenly I fell off the mountain. I continued to fall and it seemed like forever until I finally hit the bottom. Surprisingly I was not even hurt, not in the least. As I was about to stand up, lo and behold there were three fire-balls hovering over me. Bending down to the ground, I covered my head and waited for these fire-balls to hit me. I waited and waited for something to happen but it did not.

I slowly got up and there was only one fireball left but once I had stood up, the fireball moved and then slammed into me with great force. The next thing I realized was that I was in some small town where I was running through the streets screaming that I was filled with the Holy Spirit. Just as suddenly as this happened, I woke up and found that I was still in my own bed. I didn’t understand this dream at all at the time but later on I realized that God must have given me some kind of message. Today I think that I might be on the right track or at least on my way. The Lord has blessed me with writing his stories and I believe that the Holy Spirit is guiding me through my writing.

If there is someone out there that may know what this dream was all about then please let me know. I believe it was a blessing and also a message to allow God’s Holy Spirit to come into my life.

Synopsis 

Have you ever wondered what happens to some people when their faith begins to fail and then get another chance?  The Remaking of Earth is the first in a series that takes the reader on a wonderful and thoughtful journey into the world of second chances and positive change.  It is available to everyone who will believe. 

Niles and Zello have written a new view of an age-old version of faith, courage to go beyond the normal, and continue when even the very closest of friends think the characters are just plain crazy.  This is an book that you will want to read straight through, again and again. 

Click on your links above for Amazon.com to purchase your copy today.  The first chapter is available for your review on the site. 

Let us know your feedback, and watch for The Vapor, the second in the series. 

Happy reading, and believe ….

 

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