Our Testimony

Bonnie was 15 when she started her journey with Jesus. Most of her life to that point had been in small Baptist congregations in rural Indiana. Bill was raised in a family that did not attend any denomination. His father claimed to be an atheist and was well read on theories of evolution and the cosmos. His grandmother was a Methodist. She was blind and prayed for him every day. We met on a blind date in the late summer of 1968 when Bill was in the Navy. We were married June 1, 1969 in a small Baptist church in Indiana and began life together in Long Beach, California. It was during the time we were in California that our journey with Jesus really began.

It was during the hippie movement in the California landscape that the movement of the Holy Spirit, known as the Charismatic Movement, was climbing to a quick crescendo. In a small group meeting at a friend's house that I (Bonnie) first encountered a supernatural God. He placed a coal of fire in my belly that remains to this day. It has been the spark of life that forever sealed me to Him and has developed a faith in me that has carried me through some very deep and dark places. Bill was stationed on a destroyer escort ship known as the USS Kirk as a fire control technician. He was responsible for missile fire control. On that same night while on routine training maneuvers out of Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, Bill also encountered God through a shipmate that we believe to this day was the closest man to God we have ever met. This was the spring of 1972. Revival was breaking out everywhere. Several crew members were having experiences with God and before we knew it a small fellowship group was formed. We met spontaneously with each other over the next year and a half, sharing meals, breaking bread (communion), learning and studying together. People like Jack Hayford, Kenneth Hagin, Lester Sumrall, Derek Prince were all rising stars in the Charismatic and New Wine Movements. We soaked up everything we could find and went to every meeting we could get to in order to learn more about God. It was an exciting and electric time. We witnessed miracles, signs, wonders, all the things that accompany a genuine move of God.

Bill was discharged from the Navy in the summer of 1973 and we picked up our lives and moved to a small town outside of Nashville, TN. For the next 10 years we grew in the Lord and in fellowship with other believers who were leaving the denominations. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit was not acceptable in the mainline non-pentecostal denominations so participants and believers in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit were being "quietly" asked to depart. We were meeting in houses, coffee shops/bookstores, tents, motel meeting rooms, where ever we could find to gather. By the early 1980's a "settling in" had started to happen and without realizing what was happening to us, we gradually drifted toward the need for "structure" and "normal" congregational meetings - so the non-denominational congregations were born. Probably out of the need to not "be like the denominations" these congregations kept "pastors" but not the church governments that were part of the denominational system. For the most part they were led by one family and passed from father to son. Many now still have that model, though most don't have the family run congregation anymore. Now they are led by a couple who have other couples assist them. We were thick as thieves in the middle of it all; one of 12 founding couples in what is now one of the largest mega-churches in the area where we lived. We stood shoulder to shoulder with many of the mainline teachers of the day. We had a successful business, believed the prosperity doctrine, the "speak it" doctrine, the "cast out demons" doctrine. You name it - we knew it; and practiced it. We did not see the error in any of it until the spring of 1983 when the Holy Spirit opened our eyes.
What had taken 10 years to plant, nurture, and grow took 20 more to purge out of us. Through much trial, tribulation and extreme hardship, God delivered us and we stand today whole, and walking with Him in Truth, Freedom, and Relationship. His mercies, long suffering, love toward us, and grace we have finally found The Way. The straight gate - the narrow road. We've been rich (several times) and in poverty (several times) and we have learned what rich and poor REALLY means. We have experienced just about everything one human can do to another - and a lot more of what one can do to themselves. We've learned to be content in all things; how to comfort others with the comfort we have been comforted with; how to live in true prosperity - the kind that our Father in Heaven intended all along; how to stand alone and with others. It's been a long, long road from then until now and a lot of good people have prayed for us along the way. A lot of bad people have taught us how to love our enemies. We will never stop learning until He comes to take us to the wedding; but while we wait, we watch, we keep our lamps full of oil; our light burning at all times; and we have a deep desire to help others find their way. We don't have all the answers, only a fraction. But our hope is that through this blog and open lines of communication, we can walk the journey together. We are, after all, going to the same place........