Eric's Story
My story is not too difficult to put together for you. I was born the son of a Southern Baptist preacher, and we all know about preacher's kids right? Well being born and raised in the church I was keenly aware of all the appropriate "religious lingo". The only problem was that I
did not have a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ and that is what made the difference between what could have been and what was...
I received the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal savior about the time I reached my teenage years. I was not a very popular person in school, us PK's hardly ever are. We are a "peculiar people" after all. In early 1969 I went to my pastor at the close of a Sunday morning worship service and acknowledged the call of God on my life to be a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I walked in that call and anointing for about 18 months.
Soon my world began to spiral downhill on a journey that would not come to an end for another 16 years. But lest I get ahead of myself, let me share a few of the events that brought me to God's Roadblock for my life. In 1975, after being unemployed for several months I joined the peacetime US Army and served faithfully for 8 1/2 years. Almost half of that time was spent overseas in South Korea. It was there I met Hae Su Pak and we were married in 1978. One year later my son Patrick was born. About 13 months later my tour was up and we all made the journey to America. My Korean bride was abrubtly hit with culture shock and homesickness shortly after our arrival back in the states. Our relationship suffered because of it and also because of the great amount of time I was absent from the home due to my responsibilities to the military to which I was still assigned. In May 1983, I walked away from career in the military in an attempt to salvage my marriage. It was obviously too little too late because in December 1984 I was faced with divorce court. Though it was a terrible time in my life, the one bright point out of it all was that I received custody of my son Patrick. Some two years later, having struggled with the rejection of the church because of my "D-I-V-O-R-C-E!" I became actively involved with several individuals I wish now I had never come in contact with. Drugs, alcohol and crime became a way of life for several months. I lost all self-respect. My life was completely and totally out of control. I had a wonderful job as a production manager in a rapidly growing printing firm in NW Atlanta, Georgia and was terminated from there after I was arrested for Bank Robbery. I know it was the mercies of God, after six months incarceration in the Fulton County Jail, I was sentenced to 6 months in a half-way house and given 5 years probation, for Bank Robbery. A totally unreal sentence, a second chance on life, yet for one whose life was out of control, it meant little because less than two years after walking out of the half-way house, I was faced with a sentence of 16 years in the State Penitentiary in Georgia for vilolation of my probation and multiple counts of first degree felony forgery. Since much of my previous criminal background was not showing up on the computers in Cobb County and the fact that no weapons were involved in any of my crimes, my court appointed attorney assured me he would get me off with 10 years probation and restitution and probably a fine. That sounded great to me. The problem was that when I went to court even though the district attorney had agreed to the defense counsels recommendation, the judge thought jail time was in order, thus the 16 year sentence was assessed.
It was in the Cobb County Jail, awaiting sentencing that I heard Dr. Charles Stanley preaching on the subject of the Cross that called this backslidden Baptist PKto repentance. After arriving at the Diagnostic and Classification Center at Jackson, Georgia my initial reaction was stark raving fear! This wasn't any county jail. These guys were playing for keeps here, this was a maximum security facility, the highest in the state because this was where death row was located. Having rededicated my life to the Lord April the 16th, 1988 while in the county jail, I had entered a new phase in my walk with the Lord. I had begun a journey of faith that I intended to walk, regardless of the price. I had tried life all the other ways and failed miserably. My marriage was lost. My parents had obtained custody of my son while I was incarcerated in the county jail to keep the state from taking him. My job was lost. My vehicle was impounded and sold. My life was still out of control and I could do nothing to stem the growing tide of frustration and fear...that is until I rededicated my life. Then that peace that surpasses all human understanding and comprehension came in and took over. I knew the Lord Jesus was in charge of what was ahead. I was not sure of how things would work out. I did not know if everything was going to be all right or what. I just knew that Jesus had it in His hand and I was leaving it all up to him. I stood on
I Peter 5:7, casting all my cares on Him, because He cares for me. I stood on I Timothy 1: 7, "that He had not given me a spirit of fear, but of power and love and of a sound mind."
The first few days were tough enough in prison, but I had been in the military and endrured much worse over the years. The food was better than the county lock-up but that was not saying a lot. Soon after my arrival at Jackson, I made an appointment to go see the Chaplain. I will never forget him. Stanley C. Harrell was a methodist minister. A fine young man whose heart was atuned to the mind of Christ. I asked about the possiblity of working in the chapel since I had a religious background and had administrative skills from the military and I knew how to type. It took faith and prayer but eventually the assignment came through. I had the best job in the prison. Access to outside free world people, access to a marvelous library of christian books, tapes, and videos. What had been a bore and a bother for so many years was now my pas-sion. Over the course of the next several months I completed two years of Bible College via correspondence course and eventually was licensed and ordained to preach while still locked up. Before it was all said and done I was serving as "pastor in residence" in Cell House B. We saw many lives touched and many lives changed and many souls saved. One of those changed was mine.
The change came in the form of the Baptism of the Holy Ghost. I had always heard it preached against. I did not think that "tounges" were real, I thought they were of the devil. But all that changed in the twinkling of an eye lying on a bunk in the prison hospital deathly ill with hepatitus. A spirit-filled prison nurse brought in anointing oil, anointed my head and prayed for my heal- ing. In a moments time I was healed, filled with the Holy Ghost and up and out of the bed walking and talking in tounges. The infusion of power from on high was remarkable. I had never experienced anything like it in all the world. My relationship with my Lord Jesus would never be the same. My relationship with other brothers and sisters in the Lord would never be the same. My relationship with others in general would never be the same.
The Chaplain assured me I would have my old job back when I was released from the prison hospital, and he was true to his word. Several months, later while attending what we fondly referred to as Friday Night Jackson, we had a husband and wife couple who had come in to minister who spoke a word of prophecy over me and told me that God had a "little spirit-filled tounge talking woman" waiting on me when I was released. Little did I know at the time how true that was. Additionally they shared with me that they felt the Lord was to release me much sooner than my 16 years the state said I would serve. Well, that night when I got back to Cell House B, there was a letter on my bunk from the Parole Board notifying my that my case had been re-reviewed and I would be released in less than 30 days. I was speechless. I was elated. I could not sleep for days. God truly was the God of second, and third and fourth chances. I committed His Word to my heart. Matthew 6: 33 was my goal: "Seek ye first the Kingdom of Heaven and His righteousness and all these things shall be added unto you." So true! So true! So True!
Only 19 days after my release on July 2, 1990, the night of July 21, 1990 I met Faye Johnson for the first time. That very night the Holy Ghost spoke to my heart and told me I had met my new bride. I thought it was Satan speaking because she seemed to be very "married". I did not see a wedding band, but she seemed married. Well at the time she was. She was married to Jesus, as she had been for the previous 10 years since her ex-husband had committed suicide. In a few months, our paths crossed again and this time after some conversation I learned she was single. A couple of nights later coffee and hot fudge cake at Shoney's, seven weeks of dating and we were married on the first night of the eighth week. God's number for new beginnings is 8. We have now shared almost 11 years of marriage together. In fact the 16th of November 2001 we will celebrate 11 years of marriage. It has been an adventure in faith beyond just a marriage. There was the journey from Atlanta to San Antonio at the urging of the Holy Ghost, walking away from jobs and family to follow the calling of God. Then there was the two strokes that landed me in the hospital in August 1992. Yet even more exciting was in November 1992, when the Lord totally healed me of the effects of those two strokes. Faye will share in her testimony of her heart attack, time in intensive care, her stroke in 2000 and God's healing hand on her.
Then of course there was the journey from San Antonio to Dallas where God has planted us and opened the world to us ministry wise via the internet and on KSKY-660 Gospel radio from right here in the metroplex. In May 2004 we moved to KKGM-AM 1630 Gospel radio in the DFW area, and in February of 2006 we moved on to KCNW-AM 1380 Kansas City, KS.
We have been blessed many times over since our arrival in Texas. Yet with all the doors of opportunity that have opened, we have been greeted with great adversity. Yet we presevere, we hold to the words of Paul in Galatians 6:9, "that we shall reap in due season if we faint not."