God never left me.

Accepting Jesus as my savior at the age of fourteen and committing the rest of my life to him I was pretty sure he would keep me safe and never leave me. I also had many of the church prayer warriors take me aside several times during my teen years and pray for angels to guard and protect me my whole life. All through my school years and late teens, I followed the straight and narrow path of the bible teachers. Two years after graduation I turned twenty and joined the Army. That took me away from the secure environment of the church and other Christians. I experienced a new kind of life surrounded by all of the worldly things that I had tried to avoid and I started to give in to the temptations of the devil.

For the next twenty years, I lost contact with God and tried doing things the way I wanted to do them. I became resentful of the church people who denied me a lot of the things most teenagers do. I banned them from coming to my home and became angry at my mom and would use very vulgar language. Beer, cigarettes, and cussing became a part of my everyday life. I would run away from conflict when things didn't go my way. Dirty magazines and videos would help me deal with stress. Satin was working his magic on me and was leading me down a path of destruction. No matter how hard I tried to be a good man and do the right thing it usually ended up causing me or someone else a lot of pain or grief. It seemed like negativity had surrounded me and I could not see a way past it. My marriage ended in a divorce and I decided to move to Montana and live like a hermit with my two sons.
I was not aware of it at the time but Gods angles had been by my side protecting me all those twenty years. He had allowed me to exercise my free will and do it my way until out of desperation  I asked for help. God answers when we seek his help. My boss coaxed me into going to church with his family, they wanted me to meet a nice divorced lady in the church that they knew. In the service, we sat on the front row and I felt like the pastor was talking directly to me. He had a prayer time at the end of the message and I prayed and asked God to forgive my sins and give me a clean heart and help me to live a better life. I did not meet Cathy at that time but a meeting was arranged to see her at the restaurant where she worked.
We met and I liked her right away. She had two young daughters and I had two sons. We dated for about six months and then got married. It was a blended family but I knew with Gods help we would make it work. I was so happy that I had a partner to love and a new family to take care of. I was promoted to manager of a retail store and got transferred rite after we were married about 350 miles away from her parents. I found a new church and began to settle into a new and peaceful life.

Taking the family to church each week and developing new Christian friends I felt like I was growing in my spiritual life. God had certainly changed me and took away a lot of my bad habits. I found that when Satin loses his grip on a person he fights that much harder to get you back into your old ways. This new life of mine was turning out to be a little more difficult than I anticipated.  I was having financial problems with my new job and then family issues with the kids were creating a lot of stress. That's when satin would whisper in my ear go ahead and get mad just don't get violent or go ahead and tell a lie so you don't hurt the other person. He gets so sneaky sometimes that I don't even realize I committed another sin.
One time in our small group meeting at the church. The leader had a class on always be thankful to God for every blessing and every hurtful thing that we have suffered. The blessing is a show of his love for us and demonstrates how much he cares, and the hurt he will heal and use as a tool to help someone else. The leader reminded us to be thankful every day for everything good and bad, This has stuck with me and has become a habit I practice each day.
Over the last 36 years of my second marriage, I have battled with satin daily, but I have kept the faith and stayed strong. I memorized a couple of sayings that have a calming factor for me when I get frustrated,
 It's your plan God, not mine.
Anger flows from unmet expectations.
I feel I have had a rough life with tremendous stress, but the fact is that God has always been right beside me watching over my life.
Earl Baldwin