14. A Time of Reset

© 2020 Daniel Yordy

June 1985 - August 1986

Resetting Bowens Mill 
Reset – okay. That’s just what happened as I finished writing the last chapter. Bowens Mill has reset itself inside of my memory. What did I gain most from writing the last letter? First is the realization of how much I loved my students in the Bowens Mill school and how much joy teaching them was to me. 

And second is writing these words: “This was a mighty piece of evidence in God’s years-long campaign to persuade me to trust the it is He who is speaking inside of me.” I have been so very slow to believe that it is, in fact, God who has always been arising inside of me with the understanding of His word, just as He promised me from the start.

Truly, truly, the dark hole inside that has been my memory of Bowens Mill is now filled with love and joy, with memories of good things and with a completely different perspective of the difficult things. This is so wonderful.

My sharing of this next period of time, a transition between Bowens Mill and Blueberry now proceeds through two points of view. First, I must show how I saw things then, but second, I must also show how things really were. I imagined that God was not with me when, in fact, He always has been. I thought He was against me when He was always for me. I did not then understand the truth.

The Trip Home 
My younger sister, Jenelle, was attending Oral Roberts University in Tulsa, Oklahoma at this time, and so Tulsa became our first destination. I am ashamed to say that prior to this time, my younger brother and sister hardly “registered in my radar.” They were much younger than I and in my self-centered pursuit of my own interests, I had hardly noticed them.

I was having an electrical problem with the Toyota Station wagon. As we were approaching Ida, Oklahoma, the car died. We walked up to a nearby farmhouse. When the farmer came home, he offered to pull our car down to the nearest Holiday Inn motel and then come get us the next morning to pull the car to a shop. The first mechanic we went to could not discover the problem, so he sent us on to an expert in “foreign cars.” It took this guy about ten minutes to find and fix the problem, and we were on our way. We certainly felt taken care of by the Lord.

We spent a couple of days with Jenelle. She was learning to be a news video tape editor. ORU was it its height at that time and she showed us all around the campus. After that we drove on to Denver City, Texas.

We spent a couple of weeks with Richard Hernandez. Denver City is an oil town with an oil refinery. Richard owned a small home in the town. During our time with him, we made two different trips to Carlsbad Caverns in nearby New Mexico. We absolutely loved exploring the caves.

When we left Richard’s, we drove on to Albuquerque. I had managed to spend all the money mom had sent me, so I had to ask her to wire us more, which we picked up at the Western Union in Albuquerque. We also spent the afternoon visiting with Pepi Navarrete in their home. We had a good visit, but no one mentioned the community experience at Edgewood.

We headed north from Albuquerque into the upper Rio Grande Valley in Colorado. We attempted to cross over the continental divide above Silverton on a gravel road. We made it almost to the top, but had to turn around because of snowbanks and because people coming over the top were telling us that the bridge was out in the valley below. Driving my little car through water was not a good choice. We had to go back down, then turn north and then west, so that we could come at Silverton from the north, 150 miles of detour when we had been just 10 miles away. Nonetheless, the road coming into Silverton from the north is one of the most amazing feats of engineering a road through rock cliffs I have ever seen. It was breath-taking.

We headed towards San Francisco, winding just a bit to pick up more counties. We spent time in the Redwood forest before heading on up to my parent’s home in Lacomb, Oregon. Claude Savard made the statement later that one needs to travel with Daniel Yordy if one wants to see a view of America most people miss. I had a good time traveling with Claude, but I had no contact with him before or since. He was a good road companion; I remember spending hours explaining to him everything I had learned from Velikovsky. I don’t know what he made of that.

Claude spent a few weeks helping me replace the roof on our house. Afterwards, mom gave him some wages for his trip on up to Blueberry. I drove him up to Vancouver, British Columbia where he caught a bus for the trip north. We did manage to drive around the Olympic peninsula in Washington state on our way.

Back with My Parents
I had taken a long time driving home because I NEEDED a prolonged break, a time of enjoyment with no obligations.

When I arrived home, my dad was 67 years old. He had been slowing down gradually, with Parkinson’s disease, for the prior several years. He was still able to walk around a bit, with mom’s help, at that point. Within a few weeks, he went down another notch, and from then on could not walk at all. He would spend the next seven years either lying in bed or sitting in a wheel chair. He was fully aware of everything around him, but he could not speak.

I want to talk about my now “adult” relationship with my mom and my brothers and sisters. I was 28 years old, but I had never really connected with any of them as an adult. In my youth, my only thought was to head down the road, and I did not then have any real relationships with my family. In fact, it was only now that I had the capacity to consider other people, just a little bit, the first fruit of teaching in the classroom.

My brother, Franz, had sold his pig farm in Nebraska and moved with his family back to Oregon. They were renting a house on the south side of Lebanon at this time, one which Maureen and I would rent later on. I read a book once on the difference in children growing up either as the eldest, the youngest, or the middle child. The eldest is a perfectionist and believes that his parents had gone soft when the others came along. That describes Franz. The youngest has no hankering to head down the road and is there for the parents over the years. That describes my younger brother, Glenn. And the middle one is heading out to find life elsewhere; that describes me.

Glenn was the only one still home, although he was engaged, at that point, to be married to Kim Foster. Glenn had the room upstairs next to my room, which I had moved back into. Glenn worked for a dairy farmer whose farm was just down the road next to Larwood Bridge. He would have been 19. Sadly, I did not make much connection with Glenn through this season.

I do not know, even now, how to call my relationship with my mom. It remains a puzzle to me. It is a relationship of comfortable mother-son fellowship combined with a seemingly impassable disconnect. As I realize it now, I think my mom and I were so much alike. Mom was not Asperger’s, but the trait had come to me through her family line. I have learned, of course, that inherited autism is a spectrum, and the line between what is Asperger’s and what is not, is unclear. Mom was not quite Asperger’s, I was just. In some ways we were like ships passing in the fog and in other ways we were very comfortable together.

On the one hand, if there is anything I would do differently in my life, it would be those difficult elements in my relationship with my mom, but on the other hand, even if I were to redo those places with what I know now, I’m not sure anything could have been different.

I would not have survived over many years and in many ways if not for my mom. Yet in reference to her, I will be least kind to myself as I give this account.

My mother, Rhoda Yordy, was one of the greatest women of faith and devotion I have known in my life. In those things, my wife, Maureen, is very much like her.

When dad became confined to bed, unable to care for himself, my mom asserted that she could learn to do anything a nurse would do to meet his needs. She fed and cleaned him, turned him in bed, and, with my or Glenn’s help, got him into a wheelchair for a bit each day so that he could sit in the living room and enjoy the sunshine.

My mother devoted herself to caring for my father, 24/7, for seven years, with no break except my wedding at Blueberry. Besides that, she tended the garden, kept the homestead, and bailed her children out of every need we managed to stumble into. And through all, her profound relationship with the Lord Jesus in grace and joy only grew. And my brother, Glenn, with his wife, Kim, cared for her for the rest of her days.

But this is an account of my life, and so we must come back to my anger with God. When I left Bowens Mill, I instructed God as clearly as I could that I was taking back charge of my life and that He could go mind His own business. To my great consternation, God didn’t seem to get the message.

I was planning not to go to church; I wanted nothing more to do with any of it. But arriving at home, to my horror, I discovered that mom had brought a church into our living room. What could I do to escape church in our living room except give the lame excuse of going to church somewhere else? My sister Frieda and her family were attending an Assembly of God church in Albany at that time, so for awhile I went there. 

Mom had offered her home with its large living room and beautiful yard and view to a brother who lived up Roaring River Drive by the name of Dennis Cline. Dennis pastored a small group of several young couples and mom. After a few weeks I gave up and started attending services with them. Dennis was several years older than I, a wise and anointed man with a pastor’s heart. Slowly my heart began to relax in the goodness of services with them.

Working for Tim and Frieda
Jimmy Barkley was no longer in Oregon at this time. Once I had finished roofing the house, I was slow to go out to find construction work. I knew that if I got a job full-time in construction, then I would need tools, etc., and soon I would be in debt. I wanted to be free to move on, so I chose, rather, to have less income during this time. 

Tim and Frieda had purchased a property on a hillside near Jefferson, Oregon, not far from where my sister Cheryl has lived with her family all her married life. They were attempting to build a house on the property with mom’s assistance. Mom made an agreement with me that she would pay me to work on their house as well as continuing to work on my parent’s home. Apparently, dad’s retirement money was sufficient for all that was needed. Mom lived comfortably, but she was very frugal towards herself.

Tim and Freida’s house was already half constructed, with the frame and roof done. They were staying in a small travel trailer with their children, April and Ryan, next to the construction site. My task was mostly interior work, including building them a nice oak kitchen. This was the largest part of my work for them. Tim had a radial arm saw that I used for most of the cabinetmaking. I knew how to make kitchen cabinets, now, and, as I think about it, I remember that I made them a beautiful kitchen.

Until I started college in the fall of 1986 at Blueberry, these two houses were most of my work during my time at home.

My days were not packed, however, and I did take it a bit easy, sometimes working just five or six hours in a day. You see, my newly awakened desire to learn and to read the works of great literature had discovered the wonder and joy of used book stores in Albany and Portland where I could get hardcover books for 1-2 dollars. I came home with many boxes of books over time.

I spent a lot of time reading. I read Tolstoy and Cervantes, Homer and Fielding, Hugo and Dickens (again), the list is endless. I built a large book shelf for all my books, filled it, and kept on buying and reading. By May I had over a thousand books. I do like books.
God used two of those books in particular, however, in order to set me up for the great clash with God that would come to its head during the deliverance time at Blueberry. And as I see now, God was very specific in His determination towards me, that I would know His ways, even though at the time I thought it was all confusion.

The first book was The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo. The second was The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Let me explain the seasons of literature which I was not aware of at the time. Up until around 1850 a full belief in God and Christianity was simply assumed by all writers. From the end of WW1, say 1920, most literature contains no assumption of God or Christianity; there is no “rebellion” because God is not assumed. The majority of writers from around 1850 to 1920, however, placed God and religion into their stories in order to rebel against Him and in order to lead their readers into rebellion. The worst of these is Thomas Hardy, whose books and movies I refuse to consider. But the most powerful in impacting the reader is Fyodor Dostoevsky. 

With The Hunchback of Notre Dame, the problem was stupefying injustice committed by “Christian” officials. I don’t know that I have ever been moved so powerfully in anger and grief after reading a book, in the feeling of hatred against “those who should have known better.” My heart was in such convulsions that I imagined I was close to a heart attack. But it was Dostoevsky in The Brothers Karamazov who raised more poignantly than has ever been portrayed by any other the great challenge against God, that if He is so good and so powerful, then why the hell does He allow such horrifying things to happen to innocent children. By God’s intention, that same rebellion seized hold of my heart. 

God cannot answer such false accusation until He has brought it out front and center.

In the Crucible 
I have titled this period “A Time of Reset.” From dropping Claude Savard off in Vancouver until the next sub-section, which is attending the Shiloh Convention in February, is just seven months. In this portion, I want to share how my obstinance of heart against God turned into a once-again eager running back into move community.

A group of young people who were attending a YWAM, Youth with a Mission, training session in Salem, Oregon, came to our home to be part of the service with Dennis Cline. They were required as part of their training to participate in differing local services. It was about 35 miles from Salem, but somehow they had heard of Dennis.

[As an aside, later on, Dennis Cline became the pastor of the Albany Vineyard church and has played a prominent role in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in that area.] 

One of the young men who came I had known as a boy at Graham River Farm. I visited with him, and with that connection, I began to go up to the YWAM in Salem to attend some of their gatherings. One of the young ladies had also caught my eye, a further reason to attend the YWAM teachings. It turned out that she had devoted this time entirely to the Lord, so nothing ever came in that direction. 

Through this time, Richard also came through Oregon on his way up to Blueberry. He spent several days with us.

There was another young couple who attended Dennis’s services, David and Theresa Newman. They were not much older than I, and I went often to visit with them in their home, about halfway to Lebanon. I fellowshipped often with them and with Dennis and his wife, Anne, in their home as well as in church fellowship throughout this entire time period. These were good friendships and times of fellowship.

Between enjoying Dennis Cline’s services and the Spirit-filled teachings at YWAM, and good fellowship with the Newman's, my heart slowly began to soften towards the Lord. 
It is a decently long drive home from Salem, a time to ponder. As I slowly began to thaw, I also began to notice that there was a word planted inside of me, as a child in the womb, a word I could never escape. I wept much over that word, yet I was unwilling to touch it.

Bit by bit, my heart began to weep over a knowledge of God I did not possess, over a word of the revelation of Jesus Christ planted in me, a word that seemed to have no hope of fulfillment. By November, I was in great spiritual distress, unable to remain in spiritual lethargy and unable to reconnect with the vision planted in me.

One afternoon, in that distress, I picked up once again I Looked and I Saw Visions of God by Annie Schissler, laid on my bed, and read it through.

As I read her vision titled “That Most Holy Thing,” which I have included many times in my letters, I was seized with an overwhelming horror. God was doing and about to do mighty things in the earth and I was not part of them. The horror was so great that I rejected my hardness of heart and determined to reconnect with the move.

Here is that vision.

THAT HOLY THING 
As I entered His presence, He showed me something so impressive and frightening that I feared greatly. Although He specifically told me not to fear, even so, I could not feel completely at ease, for in almost unbearable pain and in great love, He tore open, as it were, His own spiritual form or body. Even though He had told me to look at it, I feared to and wanted to hide my eyes, for after this great tearing open of Himself I could see within. There I beheld something so terribly perfect in its holiness, that even the word perfection seems to sully it in my memory. This living something was very much a part of Himself, yet it seemed as though He were bringing forth, in a tremendous beginning, a new being from His own person. It was the same beginning in God that He had shown me several days before, in "The Place of a Beginning". For long eons He has waited to manifest this most Holy Thing which He is about to bring forth.

The tremendous, radiant perfection - the holy glory of this beginning that He showed me - was so far beyond expression and so filled with holiness and God-life, that I felt greatly perturbed, and trembled even though He told me over and over again not to fear. It was something too high, holy and perfect to look upon.

When He said, "The hour has now come," it seemed that He was about to explode, not in an explosion of terrible, destructive violence, but rather a pacific explosion. Then He came forth, as it were, in this explosion, and it was tremendously sweet. From this sweet, explosive breaking forth, He extended Himself over all; that is to say, He desired to manifest Himself, pouring this forth upon those of His own ones who were waiting upon Him. To me it seemed so imminent that it appeared to be right now, yet I know it was not at this moment in our time. Wherever He broke forth in this manifestation it began to extend, and the wonderful glory and ineffable sweetness of that perfect thing that He was bringing forth made such an impact upon my being that it greatly troubled me; because I could in no way understand the vision.

~~~

And here is my comment in the margin. – “This vision is to me one of the most important. I read it first 39 years ago, and it has wielded an enormous influence on my knowledge of God and the pursuit of  my heart. Based on this vision, I have contended with God over many years, that He would place this Holy Thing, His very Heart, inside of me. It is from this vision that I draw the phrase, ‘sharing heart with God.’"

You see, God was proving to me His determination which He Himself had placed inside of me to know the revelation of Jesus Christ through His Church, regardless. Nothing expresses the intense determination of my heart more than this vision.

The first step, then, after regaining my senses, was to begin again to drive up to Portland to be part of the move services there. I was no longer visiting at YWAM. The second step was to write a letter to the Blueberry eldership applying for enrollment in Covenant Life College.

The Shiloh Convention
I was much too eager to rush back into Feast of Tabernacles’ life to wait to hear back from Blueberry. So in February I drove up to Fort St John, to that area that held the magical memory of my time at Graham River Farm.

I never told anyone I was coming, and I had never been down the Blueberry road. As I drove north on the wintry roads, I was so excited. Blueberry is only about four miles down a side road to the east from the Alaska Highway. I turned down that road and promptly ran into a snow bank. Randy Jordan soon came along with the tractor and merrily pulled me out. He had been snowplowing. 

My connections at Blueberry were Judy Jones, one of the elders, and Richard Hernandez. I soon found them and stayed for a couple of days with Richard who had a room in the cabin of Judy’s sister, Joanne Branham. I met with the two main ladies involved with Covenant Life College at Blueberry, Charity Titus and Delores Topliff. It seems my application to the college was accepted. 

I was so eager to start that Sister Delores agreed that I could do a full course of self-study on Russian history that would be accepted as college credit, while I waited for September to come. At the same time, they pointed out how important my construction skills would be in meeting the many needs of the community there, enlarged as it was with young people coming to college. I agreed to move there permanently in May, with the understanding that I would return to Oregon for several weeks in the summer to be part of Glenn and Jenelle’s respective weddings.

 I was there only a couple of days, and so I will not describe Blueberry to you, not until I arrive there for school in the next chapter. Richard and I then drove over to the Shiloh Community to attend the last convention that was held there. They had just remodeled their large Tabernacle, even though that community had declined quite a bit in number from its peak of 200 members. It was so wonderful to be back into a word of the revelation of Jesus Christ and the power of a third feast anointing. 

We stayed in a large room next to the Tabernacle that was used as a food processing place above their root cellar. It had been converted into a dorm for the convention visitors. A brother about our age who had lived at Shiloh for many years showed us all around the community and told us many stories. 

Again, I will not describe Shiloh further until it becomes that most precious place for us, Blair Valley.

Richard and I also drove into Graham River and visited with the family there. Most I had known at Graham River were gone; there were maybe thirty people remaining, including Eli and Marty Miller and most of their large family as well as Harold and Mitzi Witmer. In my conversation with Brother Eli (who had participated in several of the conventions at Bowens Mill while I was there), he shared that he was planning a ministry trip throughout Oregon, Washington, and Idaho and wondered if I would drive him around. That was exciting to me, so I readily agreed.

After dropping Richard back off at Blueberry, I returned home to Oregon.

Confrontation 
I was not aware that God was preparing a great vise in which to squeeze me in His confrontation with me, this great contest between my determination to know God and my own folly and conceit. I was self-willed. And I fought with God for many years, trying to get “my way” without any success ever.

I was too impatient to start college and so I considered enrolling in Linn-Benton Community College just south of Albany. I could hear the Lord saying, “No,” quite clearly, but I was not to be deterred. One day, I was driving with my sister Frieda into Albany. I was thinking of “storming the breach” through all God’s objections and just enrolling at LBCC, regardless. 

As we were driving, Frieda was telling me a story about someone whom God had confronted and told them that He would take their life if they chose to go down a path that would take them from Him. That was not the first time I had heard such a thing. God had spoken the same thing to Sam Fife when he had sought to use the apostolic anointing in the wrong directions. “Don’t turn away from Me again, My son.” 

Freida asked me, “Do you think God would do that, take someone’s life to keep them from going in the wrong direction?”

Except I didn’t hear Frieda, I heard God through her, and I knew that God was telling me exactly that, that He valued my commitment to Him too much to lose me to darkness. That He would take me to Himself if I went down that path.

Needless to say, that was the last of any thought of LBCC.

Brother Eli flew down to Portland, and I picked him up there. We drove up to visit the small move community in Kettle Falls, Washington. There I met Don and Martha Howat and their three small children, members of that community. I really enjoyed my time there. We made stops at a couple of more places where Brother Eli shared before returning to Oregon.

Along the way, I poured out all my distress over my experiences at Bowens Mill. Brother Eli took it all in stride, but I’m sure it didn’t help him.

Back home, Eli shared a word with Dennis Cline’s group, again in my mother’s living room. He then asked to borrow my car for a visit he needed to make in Eugene, Oregon. When he returned, he was quite sheepish. Someone had driven into the back of my car and crushed in the hatchback door. My insurance covered it, however. When I got the insurance money, I decided to fix it myself, so I bond-oed and painted it. It didn’t look good, but now I had the money for my return trip to Blueberry.

During my trips to Salem, I had reconnected with Larry Jensen who was living with his parents in a double-wide trailer on the east side of Salem. I did not spend much time with him, but towards the end of April, I spent most of a day with them. Larry and his two younger brothers still lived with their mom and dad. John Jensen was still a boasting fleshpot, and Larry still treated his mother like dirt. It was then, as I was listening to Larry’s many stories about all his “accomplishments” that it dawned on me that he was making much of it up. That realization gave answer to so much confusion from our time together as kids. I think that Larry did not know that making up stories was not what really happened.

BUT – the significant part of that visit was when Larry’s youngest brother was insisting on buying a waterbed for his bedroom. John Jensen said, “No.” And so the argument began. It went on for maybe twenty minutes during which time they were on their feet hollering in rage at each other. John Jensen’s roar went all through me. “I WILL NOT HAVE THAT BED IN MY HOUSE!!!”

And so, I packed my stuff into my car to head back into Christian community. I put brackets on my large bookshelf and tied it on top of my car, loaded full with books. I roped it down with a tarp over it. I was by myself, so every cranny inside was filled with books and the few other things of my possession.

I explained to Denny Cline and all the others there where I was going and why. I said all my “Goodbye’s” and headed north on I-5. 

As I drove north from Salem, suddenly I heard the words inside my spirit, firm and unmistakable, “I will not have those books in My house.”  “Phooey on that,” was my initial response. I kept driving. 

Past Portland, “I will not have those books in My house.” Past Seattle, the urgency grew, “I will not have those books in My house.”

As I approached the Canadian border, however, the urgency became a mighty roar. “I WILL NOT HAVE THOSE BOOKS IN MY HOUSE.”

I broke, turned around, and drove back home in utter humiliation. 

I had to explain to everyone, including Dennis and Ann Cline, what God had required of me. I spent a few days selling some of the books back to the used book stores at a loss. I gave most of the rest to my brother, Franz, but kept just a few that I thought would be “OK.” 

I no longer needed the bookcase. I packed my few remaining belongings back into the car, and with my wings clipped, my hair singed, and my tail between my legs, so to speak, I drove back up north to Blueberry.

Blueberry and Weddings 
It was now springtime when I arrived at Blueberry, the snow was gone and green was beginning to appear. They were busily readying the gardens for planting, though school was not yet out. I stayed for a couple of days with Richard, but then I was invited to move into the home of Victor and Nancy Raja and their two girls, Freda and Ruth. I would live with the Raja’s for the four years I was in Covenant Life College.

There was a need for a new greenhouse, and so I was soon busy building it in the garden space just below the Raja cabin. Brother Roger Henshaw was over that project. Brother Roger was an older gentleman who had been a machinist most of his life. He and his wife, Bertie, had opened their two-story home for a number of college students. After about a month, the greenhouse was ready for service, and I headed back to Oregon for Glenn’s and Jenelle’s weddings. 

Jenelle’s wedding came first, in June. She was marrying a young man she had met at ORU by the name of Jim Hall. We rented a wedding ceremony house and yard in Salem. It was a very gallant occasion. I believe Dad was able to come. He would have been confined to the wheelchair with a sash tied around him to keep him upright.

Jim was a news camera operator. A few years later, they filmed news videos on board an aircraft carrier during the first Iraqi war. Jim also got the chance to film Boris Yeltsin in Moscow for a news interview. 

Jim and Jenelle remained in Oregon, however, after their honeymoon, to attend Glenn and Kim’s wedding in July.

Glenn had known Kim Foster for several years. Kim lived with her parents and younger sister and brother at a farmhouse less than a mile west of the dairy where Glenn worked. They had a huge and abundant grape arbor just outside their kitchen door. Glenn was like dad; Kim was always the only one for him. 

Glenn and Kim had their wedding in Kim’s grandparents’ yard, filled with flowers, not far from her parent’s house. It was funny because Kim’s parents were the same age as Glenn’s brothers and sisters and mom was the same age as Kim’s grandparents. Our family has long generations from my great-grandfather, John, on. I think that Dennis Cline conducted their wedding; I’m not sure if he did Jenelle’s as well.

Glenn and Kim now live in northern Minnesota, and I stay with them when I visit my daughter at the Upsala, Ontario, community.

Once Glenn and Kim were married, Jim Hall went down to their new home in Los Angeles. Jenelle stayed a bit longer to pack up all her things to take down. She asked Dennis Cline if she could borrow his small pickup to carry her stuff, and she asked me to drive her down to LA and then return the pickup to Dennis.

So, in the first part of August, I drove Jenelle down to Los Angeles with all her stuff in the little pickup. When we had unloaded, I did not stay long. I headed back north towards home. 

EXCEPT. Hey, I had a five-on-the-floor nicely-powered little pickup and the never-before-driven (by me) California Highway 1 unfolding in front of me. Oh, heavenly joy. A thousand feet down on the left to the Pacific always in view. A thousand feet up on the right. A VERY winding paved road in and out and a nicely-powered five speed on the floor. 

I was able to keep up with a high-powered sports car. I think the guy was amazed. Then, it was another passage through San Francisco and on home. It wasn’t long before I was in my Toyota Corona and heading back to Canada.

Return to Blueberry and College 
I did not understand my drive to Blueberry.

All the way back, every mile, I heard, “No.” It was not nearly like the loud roaring of the May attempt, but it seemed real. God seemed to be saying to me not to return to Blueberry. This made no sense to me. I could not turn back. My heart agonized the whole way, and even after I was back in the flow of Christian community, I did not sense the Spirit for nearly two weeks.

This was the second time that I kept driving in spite of the seeming “witness” inside against it. The first was my first trip to Bowens Mill.

All the way up, all I could think of was the lethargic misery of not-knowing God that would be my lot if I turned back.

If I had turned back, I would never have known the power of God in His church. If I had turned back, I would never have become a full classroom teacher.

If had turned back, I would never have married my dear wife, Maureen, nor known our four precious children. If I had turned back, I would never have had the wondrous word of Christ our life that I now share with you.

I did not turn back, but I did not understand.

The command of the gospel is to put the Lord Jesus Christ upon myself, upon all that I am, with no regard to the flesh, what it is or does.

In 1986 I drove out from my parent’s home in Oregon to drive up to Blueberry, a distance of about 1100 miles, four different times inside of six months. The first time up, I was filled with excitement and joy. The second time up, I was battered by the refusal of God and turned around before half way. The third time up, I drove in humility and peace. And the fourth time up, I drove under a cloud of unclear questions and confusion.

I know that many of the times I heard “NO,” it was truly of God, saving me from a wrong or terrible direction. I have heard such a “No” even since I have been writing this present word, this time regarding a direction one of my children wanted me to help them take. It has always been deeply humiliating, especially when I have presented the direction to others as a great idea and must then tell them that God has told me, “No.”

Yet there were times, I think, when the “No” I perceived might have been the emotions of Asperger’s. When I left the move communities in 1998, I set my heart against regarding all such feelings of “No.” This was necessary to keep hold of my sanity. 

Nonetheless, Blueberry was my most blessed experience in God and in Christian community, and Blueberry was my most difficult experience in God and in Christian community.

Here is the truth. – The way of man is not in himself; it is not in man who walks to direct his own steps (Jeremiah 10:23). – And then – God ALWAYS leads us inside of triumph (2 Corinthians 2:14).

The greatest mistake is to place not-Christ upon the course of one’s life, to make the false assumption that “I” was ordering my own steps. If God had not wanted me at Blueberry, I would never have been there. Since I was there, Christ Jesus living inside of and as me was also there.

You see, the great issue and turning point of this time, and indeed of my life, was reading the Annie visions in November 1985. In many of her visions she saw the Lord offering to believers the opportunity to enter into a next place of knowing God. She saw, however, that many refused to enter and thus God pressed them again with entering that next room in God. But when they continued to refuse, God removed His offer from them. They would never ever know what they had chosen to refuse.

To be offered a wondrous dimension of knowing and living inside of God, and to fail to enter, is to me an inconceivable horror. The fear that I might have done so is intolerable. 
And therefore, my personal response to the truth Annie saw in her visions comes out from 2 Corinthians 2:14, one of the ruling verses of the Bible. 

Here is my confession of Christ. “All of His ways concerning me are perfect. He has never led me wrong; He has never not led me.”

The reason I drove every mile that final time up to Blueberry, refusing to heed whatever uncertainty that seemed to be pressing against my way, was this determination fixed in me, to know my Father, regardless. 

Did I suffer loss? Undoubtedly. To know my Father as I do now is to have long ago accepted restraints pressing me in from every direction. 

He has led me and made me walk in darkness and not in light. Surely He has turned His hand against me time and time again throughout the day. …He has besieged me and surrounded me with bitterness and woe. He has set me in dark places… He has hedged me in so that I cannot get out; He has made my chain heavy. Even when I cry and shout, He shuts out my prayer. He has blocked my ways with hewn stone (Lamentations 3). 

I am writing this account because I must place the Lord Jesus Christ upon every moment of my life, regardless of all my pain, confusion, and darkness, regardless of any crying of the flesh.

I do not believe in “what if’s” nor do I regard anyone who asks them. God is – end of story. I will include only one “what if” inside this entire account, but only to place the Lord Jesus into the deepest point of my heart and life. That “what if” will be “What if we had stayed at Blair Valley.”

“Lord Jesus, I must have You inside of every moment of my life, carrying me inside of Yourself. Therefore, as I regard this moment of great contradiction as I arrived at Blueberry in August, 1986, I see You alone, utterly with me, carrying me inside Yourself and expressing Your intentions as me. 

“Lord Jesus, Your ways concerning me are perfect. You have never led me wrong; You have always led me. I place all the great angsts and contentions of my life utterly into You. You utterly intended me through every step and in every moment.

“Lord Jesus, I know that it is when I am feeling my worst that You are most carrying me. And I know that You and I together cause me to know my Father as His Heart intends from the beginning. 

“Lord Jesus, You are my life; I have no other life.”

There are no easy answers. Placing the Lord Jesus Christ upon all that you are will cost you everything. Yet we count all things as loss that we might KNOW Him.