Edited Text.
This is Chuck Robison. Last summer Karen and my sister Alice Weatherby motored out to Burnet, Texas to meet Pastor Willie Monnet and his wife Claudette who is also a minister in his and their church, which is titled Smoking for Jesus Ministry. That interview appears elsewhere on our webpage, I’ll leave a note right underneath here that tells you that, but here’s what we learned with Pastor Monet.
In 2005 he had a dream in January and the dream was that he was going to have to pack up his church and leave New Orleans. The next day he told his parishioners that he had this dream and he was completely dumbfounded by what could possibly mean. In September 2005, when the great storm hit and the Saturday night before it hit on Sunday. Pastor Monet, who had a large church in New Orleans (it was better than a block long and it had a lot of members) was able to get 200 of them into 40 cars to leave New Orleans.
Among those 200 people was a couple with a brand-new five day old set of twins and older people and many of the entire community that were in his church. They expected to be back in four or five days at the most because they had left New Orleans before windstorms came but when they left New Orleans this time they didn’t realize it would be the last time that any of them would ever live there.
They had to go across Louisiana and then they went into Texas all the way up to Dallas and then they looped back and they spent some time here in Austin and then they began in earnest to figure out what it was that they were supposed to do and it took a long, long time.
In the interview which I know you’re going to enjoy seeing, Pastor Monet said at every point along the way, when there is was a decision to be made, as the leader, he simply stopped and prayed and waited. He didn’t give any commands or take any action until such time as he was sure his prayer had been answered with clear direction as to what to do next.
Now to me this was an incredible lesson in patience. Here was a man who was in his late 50s, he had 200 people following him in cars and they were going all over Texas trying to find a place to live. They were able to find a series of apartments in Marble Falls that was very good for them, and other places, but they were looking for a permanent place. They had to let go of the idea that there would be returning to New Orleans.
So finally thru a very unusual set of circumstances they were entitled to ownership of a 56 acre property in the middle of the Hill Country in Texas close to one of the big lakes. It had a chapel, it had dormitories, it had houses, it had an administration building. It was absolutely perfect and these people in this congregation, who came to Texas because of this hurricane, have improved that land and improved that community, so that when you walk into their church it is totally vibrant and it’s all about trusting in God.
This man and his wife and his followers demonstrated incredible patience in the face of daily frustrations about where they were from, where they were going and why they were here. Yet because they kept their belief that the universe was unfolding exactly as it should, they knew that when the time come from for them to find a permanent place it would be better than at their beginnings.
This is true for you and me as well. If you’re going through a period in your life right now, and I am, where you’re trying to be patient and wait for the right things to come at the right time, there are plenty of examples of people out there who said yeah we’ve got a lot to wait for and I guess all we can do is be patient.
So here’s something for you to think about and this is from a Master in Burnet Texas. When you’re faced with a decision of what to do next, it is wise to say a prayer and say “I know you will show me exactly what to do when the time is right”. Even if you have problems believing that God is going to talk to you, and you shouldn’t because he is, but even if you have problems with that, just stopping long enough to gather patience for yourself and to put yourself in a position where you can hear and listen to what’s coming, you might experience what I’ve experienced a number of times in my life and that is: regardless of what you want, you need to ask for it.
Once you’ve done that you need to add one more sentence at the end of what it is you’ve asked for in that sentence. “This or something better.” Because if you do not get what you’re wishing for then God will see to it that the reason for that is something better is coming along. It might not be something better in terms of what your community sees, it might be something better for your soul and your soul came here to learn some very powerful lessons. As you release all your concerns and your fear, you begin to realize that this is fundamentally the experience of your soul in this third dimensional environment and that you came here to learn.
In your case, in my case and most everybody else’s case, some very powerful difficult lessons are resolved and you can relax and say. “ Okay I came here for that. I know that. Bring it on.” And you will never find that you are given a lesson greater than what you can deal with regardless of the size, regardless of who you are, regardless, your lessons are tailor-made for you, just as mine are tailor-made for me. As you look back over your life you may see one day that there’s a pattern here. It appears as though most of my lessons were developed in dealing with patience or power or love or abandonment, whatever the issues were, those issues have been in your life to help your soul. They were custom-made in your life to help your soul learn the lessons you came here to learn.
And the powerful lesson for me is demonstrated all around us and you’ll see that when you watch Pastor Monet. The lessons that you came here to learn are being brought to you right on time.
This is Chuck this is the Masters Class and I thank you for being with us. We’ll see you next week.
Recent Comments