For the second God story I am going to focus on an what can happen when the power of God gets ahold of an individual who is not living life right. An individual named Richard Schlotter, who is now an Assembly of God pastor in Iowa, is an example of how powerful God is when an individual yields to Him. Although this man has been in the ministry for the past three years (2 as a youth pastor and 1 as a senior pastor) he lived a life of drug addiction and incarceration before becoming the Man of God he is today.
"I knew my life had to change."
When Schlotter was 23, he found himself in the county jail facing a drug manufacturing charge, facing the possibility of ten years in prison for the offense. To make matters worse, his wife was planning on divorcing him. The ministry team from the very church that he pastors today came to his cell and told him about the Gospel. Richard Schlotter cried out to God to forgive him of his sins. He became a new person that day and decided to change his lifestyle and become a better husband to his wife Kelly if given the chance.
"I didn't deserve my wife because of the bad choices I had made"
Mr. Schlotter began fervently praying that his wife's heart would be softened toward him. He knew that it would be a long, difficult road ahead of him because of how he had treated her. The guilt he felt was particularly strong for an incident where he was in a drug-induced state and threatened to kill his wife and two children and held them hostage. After three months however, his prayers were answered and his wife sent him a letter saying she wanted to visit. God helped to restore the relationship when she visited and later his wife and two boys became believers as well. After serving 18 months of his sentence, he began a Sunday School class for former inmates such as himself which eventually grew to 50 members. He would later become the youth pastor and then senior pastor at the very church that visited him when he was an unbeliever.
While this isn't necessarily an example like the last entry, this is still important because it demonstrates what God can do when a life is yielded to Him, as Mr. Schlotter did. There is a 4 Him song that touches on the issue a lot better than I can:
Lay it all on the Line
So don't go wastin' your time
Holding on to your life
There are treasures that I have possessed
Meant the world to me
But they never filled the emptiness
I needed something more than these
In the middle of my wilderness
God reached down to me
When I let go to His tenderness
I found this life was more than I ever dreamed
CHORUS
So don't go wastin' your time
Holding on to your life
Just lay it all on the line
Gotta make up your mind
There can be no more compromise
Just lay it all on the line
It's a matter of surrendering
Every hidden fear
And by letting go of everything
Jesus will meet you there
In the heart of every one of us
There's a call to faith
Even though we'll never measure up
That's why the Savior, that's why the Savior came
Gone are the days of holding on
This is the time to surrender
Now is the moment you've got to let it go
Just let it go (repeat)
Don't go wastin' your time
Gotta make up your mind
There can be no more compromise
Just lay it all on the line
You see, I am also a lot like Pastor Schlotter and this has a lot to do with my motivations for starting this blog. Just like him, God met me in my wilderness as well and when I finally did relinquish what I was holding on to, God did meet me there!
*For more information on Pastor Schlotter and his family go to: http://www.fpagoi.org/?TargetPage=541345FF-993D-4829-B134-C8FB1C9FB169
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