Stray Cats

<body topmargin=0 leftmargin=0 marginheight=0 marginwidth=0> <table cellpadding=0 cellspacing=0 border=0 height="100%"><tr> <td valign="top" width=168 BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF" background="002a11c3.png"> <div> <IMG SRC="0778e920.png" border=0 width="142" height="146" ALIGN="BOTTOM" HSPACE="0" VSPACE="0"></div> <div> <A HREF="index.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Home Page"><U>HOME</U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id4.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Book Page"><U>BOOKS   </U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id6.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Articles"><U>ARTICLES</U></A></div> <bR> <div>  <A HREF="id7.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Tapes"><U>TAPES</U></A>   </div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id8.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Spiritual Warfare/Occult "><U>SPIRITUAL WARFARE, OCCULT   </U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id77.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Sexual Abuse Issues"><U>SEXUAL ABUSE ISSUES</U></A></div> <bR> <div> <A HREF="id11.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="Exposing the Darkness Seminar"><U>***EXPOSING THE DARKNESS SEMINAR***</U></A></div> <div> <A HREF="mailto:greid@elp.rr.com" TARGET="_top" TITLE="mailto:greid@elp.rr.com"><U> <img src="HTMLobj-782/aniGif.gif" border="0" align="bottom" width="67" height="50">  </U></A></div> </td> <td valign="top" BGCOLOR="#000000" TEXT="#F7F7FF"> <bR> <div>                              <FONT SIZE="6" COLOR="#0000FF" FACE="Arial" >Stray Cats</FONT></div> <bR> <div>     I really, really dislike cats. I think they're part of the fall, I just can't prove it. They make me sneeze. They make me wheeze. They make me mad. They ignore me. Now, dogs are cool. You can beat the snot out of dogs, and they'll lay there and say, "Ooh, I hate this, but go ahead, I love you, thank you for hitting me!" (By the way, lest animal rights wackos burn vegetables on my lawn, I do not recommend beating your dog, unless it's a disciplinary whack on the behind for munching your geraniums.)  Cats - well, ever try bathing a cat? At worst, they'll turn your arms into hanging gardens. At the least, they'll look at you with hateful stares, like, "I don't NEED this!" Why some people keep the little hairballs, just because they're "amusing and cute", is beyond me. I know a piranha that fits that description.</div> <div>         </div> <div>     </div> <div>       But, I digress...</div> <bR> <div>      It was 1985, and I was in Everman, Texas, population tiny, and I was running. I wasn't really running from God, but I was running from my call. Maybe it's the same thing. I'd had ten years of ministry. I went in idealistic, energetic and full of vision. By the time I ran, I had nothing left. I'd been unprepared for the frustration, hurt and failure I encountered. I wanted desperately to help hurting people. I found plenty of them. I helped a few. But then I began being hounded by living spiritual vampires. (Anyone who has been in ministry, especially pastors, knows what I'm talking about.) They say, "Help meeee!", and they look so pitiful, so defenseless, that they pull you right in, attach themselves to you, and proceed to suck every bit of spiritual life and strength they can from you, then they discard you when you fail to meet their every need, and leave you, a mere hollow shell of your former self, as they move on in search of a fresh victim. They give nothing, they never grow, they just take and take and demand and whine, they're problems are always emergencies and only YOU can help. Well, the entire Society of Christian Bloodsuckers had found me, and within a few short years, they'd taken it all. I never wanted to help another person again. I was finished.</div> <bR> <div>         So it was Sunday, it was June, it was East Texas. I was staying with dear friends who were kind enough to give me their hearts and home until I got over the anger and hurt. I was having a bad day. I ran out of gas a mile from the house. I slammed my car door and proceeded to walk home in the humid, mosquito-infested heat. (For the record, I think they are of more value than cats.) So I'm walking down this country road, and I pass a cactus patch, and I hear a MEW. (I was really beginning to think God just really didn't like me.) I peered inside the cactus bush, and there was two pathetic, scrawny, sickly, abandoned, scared kittens. They were trapped between vicious Texas thorns with no way out. Yes, I freed them. I had to. They were so vulnerable. So frightened.</div> <bR> <div>         Having done my duty, I walked away and proceeded home. They FOLLOWED me! I looked back and there they were, merrily trotting along after me - in the middle of the road! "I'm NOT your MOTHER!!", I mumbled, grabbed them, set them back on the side of the road. "STAY!", I commanded them. Right. They followed me - back in the center of the road - I put them back - on it went, 'till we were home.</div> <bR> <div>         I fed them, but I couldn't keep them. I really wanted to, even  though they were cats. But I couldn't impose the little fuzzballs on my friends.</div> <bR> <div>         I took them to the animal shelter the next morning. They put them to sleep. It really upset me. It put a strange, God-made crack in my angry heart.</div> <div>         </div> <div> The next day, I was trying to sleep in and take advantage of my friends' time away on vacation and a silent house. The doorbell rang.</div> <bR> <div>         Now, only those who have seen me when I get up in the morning understand the peril one puts themselves in by waking me, or the fright an unprepared person faces when I open the front door.</div> <bR> <div>         I stumbled to the door and opened it, prepared to be my very rude best to some Jehovah's Witness or Mary Kay saleslady. But there stood a scrawny, black haired kid of about 12 with a bike. "Roger there?", he smiled. "No", I said groggily, almost growling in a demonic sort of way. "Oh", he said disappointed. "He's on vacation", I offered. "Oh", he said a second time. "I'm Jeremy", he said, sticking out his hand. I'm not a pastor. I don't do handshakes anymore. But for some dumb reason I shook his hand. "I'm Greg." (Shut the door, one two THREE!...) "I wanted to see if Roger wanted to go bike riding with me", he said. "He's on vacation", I repeated like a groggy parrot. "Oh", Jeremy said, then his face lit up. "You wanna go?" "Yeah, sure, give me a minute", I said, not sure why I'd do any more than cling desperately to a coffee pot this early in the morning. But I did go, and for an hour, we rode, and Jeremy talked and talked like I was his best friend or something. It bothered me. He didn't know me. I could have been a molester, a murderer, anyone, yet he was so trusting...it scared me for him. He was so...vulnerable. A cat flashed through my mind.</div> <bR> <div>         As Jeremy rode off and I shut the door, I heard God's voice deep in my heart: "Son, I'm not through with you yet."</div> <div>         </div> <bR> <div>      The next day, I was working on my car, and Jeremy came over, then Craig, then Jason on his skateboard, and Aaron on his, and Levi on his...and soon there were close to ten kids, sitting on their skateboards, asking me who I was, where I came from. I told them about me, but I told them a lot more about Jesus. They had 1000 questions and they stayed till well after dark. Toward the end, Shannon looked up at me and said, "Man, I'm so glad there's someone around who'll answer our questions and talk to us about God!" ("Son, I'm not through with you yet...") That night, despite my hurt, my anger and my sense of failure over the last several years, I surrendered to God. "God, if You still want to use me, I'm Yours. Take it all. Heal me. These kids need You, Jesus. They're so scared, so vulnerable..." (A cat flashed through my mind.)</div> <bR> <div> "Whatever it takes, Jesus, do it."</div> <bR> <div>         For the next two years, I made the kids on Smith Street in Everman Texas my friends. I hurt for them. I tried to tell them who Jesus was. The world came and got most of them. I can only pray they will remember - and someday, come Home.</div> <bR> <div>         Those kids and those stray cats - I'll never forget them. I even wrote this:</div> <bR> <DIV ALIGN="LEFT"></DIV> <div>          I wish I could gather them all, The homeless, hurting lost strays  </div> <div>          I wish I had a home to give them, Family to care, healing to share.   </div> <div>          But I'm one man,   </div> <div>         And I can neither gather them, nor turn them away.</div> <div>       </div> <div>    </div> <div>        I moved to El Paso in 1987, where God explained and unfolded the "I'm not through with you yet", as he brought me a handful of "strays" for us to love, to talk to about Jesus...</div> <div>       </div> <div>     </div> <div>       Unlike cats, I love these stray kids. I honestly don't know why they "follow" me. Maybe because I see their hurt, maybe because they know I won't hurt them. Whatever the reason, if they follow, I'll do my best to lead them to Jesus.</div> <bR> <div>         He's the Shepherd of Strays.</div> <bR> <div>      <A HREF="id164.htm" TARGET="_top" TITLE="A Moment Out Of Time"><U> CHAPTER TWELVE - A MOMENT OUT OF TIME</U></A></div> </td> </tr></table></body>