If I were a perfect Christian, I would always be upbeat and positive. I would always be confident in the Lord's protection and provision. I would never become fearful, worried or distressed. But I am not a perfect Christian.
Some days are better than others. Sometimes I am able to enjoy the day in a relatively carefree manner. But when funds start to run low and I don't know where my next paycheck is coming from, I start to think about just how close I am to the possibility of a disaster which will leave me homeless and living in the street or in a homeless shelter.
On past occasions, my depression has become so severe that I have contemplated suicide. I've also experienced physical symptoms, in recent years, which I know are direct results of the depression. Shortness of breath, an excessively fast heartbeat, tingling in my extremities (such as my fingertips) and other similar symptoms have accompanied some of my episodes of depression.
It's possible, of course, that those symptoms have been tied to the hypertension I discussed in an earlier blog post. But it's also possible that at least some of the hypertension is directly attributable to the depression. Stress is listed as one of the causes of hypertension, and an unemployed person who is running out of time and money is generally under a lot of stress.
Nevertheless, the Lord has taken me through those times of depression, and I'm still alive and kicking. Well, alive at any rate. I don't do a whole lot of kicking.
Considering the fact that I've been unemployed for the bulk of 2007, I have done fairly well in comparison with similar experiences in the more distant past. But I've still had moments of anguish, despair and fear during the past year, and even in the past few days.
When I experience such moments, I find that the best way to find relief is to fight back. I have to actively speak positive thoughts which are full of faith in Christ, even though those thoughts may not reflect the way I am really feeling at the moment.
Sometimes, I remind myself of various scriptures which encourage me. At other times, I sing a little song to myself. It goes like this:
God is gonna' take care of me,
even though how is hard to see.
Faithful to him, I have got to be,
for God will take care of me.
In the middle of the darkest night,
I have got to put up a fight,
resist the Devil with all my might,
for I'm walking by faith and not by sight.
Is it a magical formula which instantly makes all of my worries disappear? No. But it does seem to help a lot.
Showing posts with label fear. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fear. Show all posts
Sunday, June 24, 2007
Sunday, January 28, 2007
Trusting God Is Sometimes Easier Said Than Done
Every once in a while, I like to search the web to get additional information about the Pettigrew family. Today, I found the Pettigrew Family Genealogy Site, containing detailed information which was apparently compiled by one Pat Fincher Pettigrew before she went on to be with the Lord.
The site features a Bible verse of the day. As it so happens, the verse for today was:
"Don't concern yourself about what you will eat or drink, and quit worrying about these things.... Rather, be concerned about his [the Father's] kingdom. Then these things will be provided for you." ... Luke 12:29
I was undoubtedly meant to see that verse. I'm hardly unfamiliar with the verse, of course. I've known the verse for most of my life. (Matthew has a verse which says pretty much the same thing.) But I have to confess, it touches on a personal weakness of mine.
Some folks have major trouble with sexual sin or addiction to drugs or alcohol. But personally, I find that trusting God to provide for my needs on a daily basis is something I still struggle with. It's my own personal version of "Fear Factor". When the money starts to run low (and it frequently does), I start seeing terrifying visions in which I am tossed out on my ear with no place to live but the mean streets of the city of Chicago.
Why does this frighten me? For numerous reasons, but probably the most powerful reason is that I am not content to merely survive. I have a vision of what God wants to do in my life, and I firmly believe that it is achievable, provided that I can manage to avoid events, such as eviction, which would set me back many years!
The scriptures affirm that a man's life does not consist of that man's possessions. Very true. But there are cases in which possessions are crucial if one is to achieve certain things.
For example, if I were to lose my computer and my access to the Internet, it would be significantly more difficult for me to set up the online ministry I'm trying to start at ArtisticChristians.com.
When it comes to my fears of living on the street, there is a basis for those fears. I have come very close to losing it all, in terms of my material possessions.
I've never actually lived on the street, per se, but I've been in several situations where I would have had to do so if it had not been for the charitable acts of my fellow Christians.
It also helped that I wasn't too proud to beg for help.
Now, a man has to do what a man has to do, and if begging for assistance is what one has to do in order to survive, then one begs for assistance. But begging is no fun, and that's a mild understatement. Begging is humiliating. The reason it's humiliating is, in part, because the people from whom one is forced to ask for help sometimes do their best to make sure that it's a humiliating experience.
Frequently, one finds that the generosity of others comes with strings attached. Usually, those strings are emotional. It seems that some people think that offering charitable assistance entitles them to denigrate the person they are helping in ways which bear little or no relation to the actual facts of the situation. The mere fact that one has been forced to beg for help is taken as de facto evidence that one's character is severely deficient.
One pastor who helped me out in the early nineties accused me of being "lazy". This, despite the fact that he knew that I had only recently lost my job, and despite his knowledge of the fact that I was devoting approximately 16 hours a day to that job at that time.
It was a job in a retail music store. It took me 2 hours to get there on the bus every morning, and another 2 hours to get home on the bus that night. I worked from 10:00 a.m. when the store opened to 10:00 p.m., which was an hour past the time when the store closed.
If that was "lazy", I couldn't help wondering just what I would have had to do in order to prove to this pastor that I was a hard and diligent worker. Devote all 24 hours of every day to my job? Funny, I didn't see him doing that with his own job!
Yes, I lost the music store job, but it had nothing to do with being "lazy". I just wasn't making enough sales, despite my best efforts. Anyone who has ever worked in sales knows that that is always a possibility. If folks are clueless regarding such matters (as this pastor apparently was), I would suggest that they read "Death of A Salesman", by Arthur Miller.
I was and am genuinely grateful for the temporary help that the aforementioned pastor extended to me for a period of time when I needed that help, but that was no excuse for the abusive things that he said to me in order to force me to leave and find housing elsewhere at a time when I still did not have adequate money with which to do so (thanks to the fact that I had recently been robbed while visiting the Oak Park YMCA in order to try to get a room).
That was hardly the only time that sort of thing had happened to me. Memories of incidents like that one still burn in my mind even to this day. Such memories make it hard for me to trust God to provide for me. Yes, I've survived, but I've had to go through some things no human being should ever have to go through in order to do so.
When it comes to the role Christians have played in dealing with my difficulties, it's kind of a "glass half full, glass half empty" kind of situation. On the one hand, I have always received the help I needed, more or less. And as I say, I am grateful for that fact. Christians certainly could have responded with total indifference to my needs. To their credit, they did not.
But helping a person means more than just providing for that person's material needs. It also means being sensitive to the fact that being forced to beg for help or forbearance is inherently stressful for most normal people. It means showing kindness and love to the people you help, knowing that that is how you would want to be treated if you ever found yourself in a similar situation. (It's called the Golden Rule. Look it up in the Bible. Do unto others as you would have them to do unto you.) I'm sorry to say that most of the Christians I've dealt with have fallen way short in that department.
Not that any of that excuses my failure to trust God for provision. I know, intellectually, that God can be trusted to provide for my needs. It's just that when the sheriff is banging on one's door at 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning, with the intent of serving one an eviction notice because one has fallen behind on one's rent, it's still difficult to incorporate that intellectual knowledge into the way one views the world. During such moments, the world seems like a cruel and hostile place, and God seems like he is pretty indifferent to the sufferings of those who have to experience that cruelty and hostility.
That visit from the sheriff that happened to me several years ago. I was already starting to sink into depression in response to my situation, and that visit from the sheriff made things even worse. Not long after that, I spent a miserable weekend at a local mental health hospital after trying to kill myself by swallowing more than an entire bottle of over-the-counter sleeping pills.
At the time when I took the pills, I was just sick and tired of dealing with the stress of life on this earth. I was sick and tired of being told that God loved me by people who demonstrated, through their indifference to the truth regarding my own situation, that they really didn't care whether I lived or died.
Yet, I attribute the fact that I am still alive today to God's miraculous intervention.
That night, I knelt beside my bed, in fear and trembling, not knowing what was coming next. I poured my heart out to God. I told God that I just couldn't deal with living in this world of pain any longer. I longed for genuine relief. I longed with all my heart to be joined with God in heaven.
I told God that I wanted to die, but I added that if God wanted me to live, if God had a higher purpose for me here which I couldn't yet see, I was willing to accept his will and to do my best to do his will.
The next morning, to my great surprise, I awoke to a new day. The effects of the pills could be clearly felt. I could barely move my limbs. For about a day or so, my legs would not even support the weight of my body. But I was alive.
I now realize that that was a test of my faith. I almost completely failed the test. If I had not prayed that prayer of submission, I think I might have failed that test, and I might not be typing these words today. But I had not abandoned my faith. I have not abandoned my faith. I will not abandon my faith!
I know in whom I have believed. When I committed my life to Jesus Christ at age 13, in 1969, I was putting my faith in Jesus Christ, not in that imperfect institution known as the Church. Yes, it's true, the Church is in some respects the Body of Christ. But the Church is comprised of weak and fallible sinners. They have been saved, but in terms of personal virtue, they have not yet arrived at their final destination. And when I say "they", perhaps I should include myself and change the pronoun to "we".
My faith in Christ is real, but it is not what it ought to be.
If my faith was what it ought to be, I would live a fearless life. I would remind myself that Jesus himself suffered greatly while he was here on this earth. The scriptures tell us that "foxes have holes, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to rest his head." For at least 3 years of his life, Jesus was a homeless man. I don't know how many of those nights he had to literally sleep under the stars, but it seems to be clear that when he was not doing so, he was staying with other people who chose to offer him lodging for the night. He was not living in any mansion. He was not staying at any 5 star hotel. He was taking whatever he could get.
As for false accusations, Jesus is no stranger to those, either. He did miracles, and how was he thanked? He was accused by some people (often the religious leaders of the day) of performing those miracles through the power of the Devil! Talk about ingratitude.
Jesus knows my grief and my pain, because he's been there.
I write the above words because once again, I am going through a time of trial in relation to my finances. I know that God will provide for me and I will survive, but it's still stressful, because I don't like having to ask for help, and it is likely that I will have to do so again in the very near future.
I pray that I will receive the mercy and help I need so that this time of trial will be as short as possible.
I further pray that such help will be extended to me in a more loving and generous spirit than I have received from some people who have claimed to speak in God's name.
Most of all, I pray that no matter how people respond and no matter what happens to me, I will never abandon my faith, and I will never forget that God loves me with a love so deep that it cannot be measured.
The site features a Bible verse of the day. As it so happens, the verse for today was:
"Don't concern yourself about what you will eat or drink, and quit worrying about these things.... Rather, be concerned about his [the Father's] kingdom. Then these things will be provided for you." ... Luke 12:29
I was undoubtedly meant to see that verse. I'm hardly unfamiliar with the verse, of course. I've known the verse for most of my life. (Matthew has a verse which says pretty much the same thing.) But I have to confess, it touches on a personal weakness of mine.
Some folks have major trouble with sexual sin or addiction to drugs or alcohol. But personally, I find that trusting God to provide for my needs on a daily basis is something I still struggle with. It's my own personal version of "Fear Factor". When the money starts to run low (and it frequently does), I start seeing terrifying visions in which I am tossed out on my ear with no place to live but the mean streets of the city of Chicago.
Why does this frighten me? For numerous reasons, but probably the most powerful reason is that I am not content to merely survive. I have a vision of what God wants to do in my life, and I firmly believe that it is achievable, provided that I can manage to avoid events, such as eviction, which would set me back many years!
The scriptures affirm that a man's life does not consist of that man's possessions. Very true. But there are cases in which possessions are crucial if one is to achieve certain things.
For example, if I were to lose my computer and my access to the Internet, it would be significantly more difficult for me to set up the online ministry I'm trying to start at ArtisticChristians.com.
When it comes to my fears of living on the street, there is a basis for those fears. I have come very close to losing it all, in terms of my material possessions.
I've never actually lived on the street, per se, but I've been in several situations where I would have had to do so if it had not been for the charitable acts of my fellow Christians.
It also helped that I wasn't too proud to beg for help.
Now, a man has to do what a man has to do, and if begging for assistance is what one has to do in order to survive, then one begs for assistance. But begging is no fun, and that's a mild understatement. Begging is humiliating. The reason it's humiliating is, in part, because the people from whom one is forced to ask for help sometimes do their best to make sure that it's a humiliating experience.
Frequently, one finds that the generosity of others comes with strings attached. Usually, those strings are emotional. It seems that some people think that offering charitable assistance entitles them to denigrate the person they are helping in ways which bear little or no relation to the actual facts of the situation. The mere fact that one has been forced to beg for help is taken as de facto evidence that one's character is severely deficient.
One pastor who helped me out in the early nineties accused me of being "lazy". This, despite the fact that he knew that I had only recently lost my job, and despite his knowledge of the fact that I was devoting approximately 16 hours a day to that job at that time.
It was a job in a retail music store. It took me 2 hours to get there on the bus every morning, and another 2 hours to get home on the bus that night. I worked from 10:00 a.m. when the store opened to 10:00 p.m., which was an hour past the time when the store closed.
If that was "lazy", I couldn't help wondering just what I would have had to do in order to prove to this pastor that I was a hard and diligent worker. Devote all 24 hours of every day to my job? Funny, I didn't see him doing that with his own job!
Yes, I lost the music store job, but it had nothing to do with being "lazy". I just wasn't making enough sales, despite my best efforts. Anyone who has ever worked in sales knows that that is always a possibility. If folks are clueless regarding such matters (as this pastor apparently was), I would suggest that they read "Death of A Salesman", by Arthur Miller.
I was and am genuinely grateful for the temporary help that the aforementioned pastor extended to me for a period of time when I needed that help, but that was no excuse for the abusive things that he said to me in order to force me to leave and find housing elsewhere at a time when I still did not have adequate money with which to do so (thanks to the fact that I had recently been robbed while visiting the Oak Park YMCA in order to try to get a room).
That was hardly the only time that sort of thing had happened to me. Memories of incidents like that one still burn in my mind even to this day. Such memories make it hard for me to trust God to provide for me. Yes, I've survived, but I've had to go through some things no human being should ever have to go through in order to do so.
When it comes to the role Christians have played in dealing with my difficulties, it's kind of a "glass half full, glass half empty" kind of situation. On the one hand, I have always received the help I needed, more or less. And as I say, I am grateful for that fact. Christians certainly could have responded with total indifference to my needs. To their credit, they did not.
But helping a person means more than just providing for that person's material needs. It also means being sensitive to the fact that being forced to beg for help or forbearance is inherently stressful for most normal people. It means showing kindness and love to the people you help, knowing that that is how you would want to be treated if you ever found yourself in a similar situation. (It's called the Golden Rule. Look it up in the Bible. Do unto others as you would have them to do unto you.) I'm sorry to say that most of the Christians I've dealt with have fallen way short in that department.
Not that any of that excuses my failure to trust God for provision. I know, intellectually, that God can be trusted to provide for my needs. It's just that when the sheriff is banging on one's door at 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning, with the intent of serving one an eviction notice because one has fallen behind on one's rent, it's still difficult to incorporate that intellectual knowledge into the way one views the world. During such moments, the world seems like a cruel and hostile place, and God seems like he is pretty indifferent to the sufferings of those who have to experience that cruelty and hostility.
That visit from the sheriff that happened to me several years ago. I was already starting to sink into depression in response to my situation, and that visit from the sheriff made things even worse. Not long after that, I spent a miserable weekend at a local mental health hospital after trying to kill myself by swallowing more than an entire bottle of over-the-counter sleeping pills.
At the time when I took the pills, I was just sick and tired of dealing with the stress of life on this earth. I was sick and tired of being told that God loved me by people who demonstrated, through their indifference to the truth regarding my own situation, that they really didn't care whether I lived or died.
Yet, I attribute the fact that I am still alive today to God's miraculous intervention.
That night, I knelt beside my bed, in fear and trembling, not knowing what was coming next. I poured my heart out to God. I told God that I just couldn't deal with living in this world of pain any longer. I longed for genuine relief. I longed with all my heart to be joined with God in heaven.
I told God that I wanted to die, but I added that if God wanted me to live, if God had a higher purpose for me here which I couldn't yet see, I was willing to accept his will and to do my best to do his will.
The next morning, to my great surprise, I awoke to a new day. The effects of the pills could be clearly felt. I could barely move my limbs. For about a day or so, my legs would not even support the weight of my body. But I was alive.
I now realize that that was a test of my faith. I almost completely failed the test. If I had not prayed that prayer of submission, I think I might have failed that test, and I might not be typing these words today. But I had not abandoned my faith. I have not abandoned my faith. I will not abandon my faith!
I know in whom I have believed. When I committed my life to Jesus Christ at age 13, in 1969, I was putting my faith in Jesus Christ, not in that imperfect institution known as the Church. Yes, it's true, the Church is in some respects the Body of Christ. But the Church is comprised of weak and fallible sinners. They have been saved, but in terms of personal virtue, they have not yet arrived at their final destination. And when I say "they", perhaps I should include myself and change the pronoun to "we".
My faith in Christ is real, but it is not what it ought to be.
If my faith was what it ought to be, I would live a fearless life. I would remind myself that Jesus himself suffered greatly while he was here on this earth. The scriptures tell us that "foxes have holes, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to rest his head." For at least 3 years of his life, Jesus was a homeless man. I don't know how many of those nights he had to literally sleep under the stars, but it seems to be clear that when he was not doing so, he was staying with other people who chose to offer him lodging for the night. He was not living in any mansion. He was not staying at any 5 star hotel. He was taking whatever he could get.
As for false accusations, Jesus is no stranger to those, either. He did miracles, and how was he thanked? He was accused by some people (often the religious leaders of the day) of performing those miracles through the power of the Devil! Talk about ingratitude.
Jesus knows my grief and my pain, because he's been there.
I write the above words because once again, I am going through a time of trial in relation to my finances. I know that God will provide for me and I will survive, but it's still stressful, because I don't like having to ask for help, and it is likely that I will have to do so again in the very near future.
I pray that I will receive the mercy and help I need so that this time of trial will be as short as possible.
I further pray that such help will be extended to me in a more loving and generous spirit than I have received from some people who have claimed to speak in God's name.
Most of all, I pray that no matter how people respond and no matter what happens to me, I will never abandon my faith, and I will never forget that God loves me with a love so deep that it cannot be measured.
Saturday, November 11, 2006
An Urgent Plea for Help and Prayer
The following blog post may be of interest to people searching for terms such as Christian music, Christian art, Christian ministry, Christian charity, Christian benevolence, emergency funds, Chicago Christians, etc.
Introduction
Background Information
Health Issues
My Other Blog
The Christian Artists' Resource Center
More About Me
The Chase
My Contact Information
Concluding Comments
Postscript Re: Print Sales
INTRODUCTION
Have you ever had an iron anvil dropped on your head? Neither have I, but I think I have a pretty good idea what it would feel like, because I've felt that way a number of times in my life, and I feel that way now. I'm writing this blog article in order to explain why that is the case.
Now, you may be from the "cut to the chase" school, and you may just want to know what the main topic of the blog is all about. Well, that's why they make scroll bars and internal links and anchors. You don't have to read this entire blog post if you don't want to do so.
You can scroll to the bottom of the post right away (or click "the chase") and you can get all of the basic information you need without bothering to get any background information which would help you to put this urgent plea into its proper context.
I'm providing preliminary background information for the sake of those who are inclined to be skeptical about pleas for help, and who feel that they need to know a lot more before they will donate anything to help a person in need.
Back to Introduction
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
If you've read all of the other blog posts on this site, then you know that my primary passion in life is using my artistic talents (as a musician, writer, poet, photographer, pen & ink portrait artist, digital artist and more) as a means of doing the best I can to serve the Lord Jesus Christ.
Unfortunately, achieving the goal of making a full time living pursuing that passion has been much easier said than done. Consequently, I have struggled with finances for a substantial portion of my life, and I've often found myself working at jobs which paid poorly and which had little or nothing to do with my passion.
For the past nine months, I have been working about 30 hours a week as a telephone surveyor. It is hardly what I would describe as my dream job, but I desperately needed a job when I was hired there in the middle of February 2006, and I couldn't afford to be very choosy. Since losing my job as a legal assistant in the middle of October 2005, I had been unemployed, with the exception of a couple of very brief temp assignments doing office work.
I'd been very active in my job search, particularly in terms of responding to classified ads I had found at CraigsList, but I hadn't managed to find an office job despite my numerous job skills, which included a typing speed of 65 to 70 wpm, as well as fluency in Microsoft Word and Access (with more limited knowledge of Excel and Powerpoint).
What's worse, my former boss had successfully challenged my application for unemployment insurance benefits, and I'd never made a huge amount of money at that job to begin with, so I had very little money to live on. I was beginning to get desperate.
I might have been evicted from my apartment for non-payment of rent if it had not been for a monetary gift which I received from the church I was attending (and still sometimes attend). But that money only went so far. I didn't want to have to go to that church and ask for similar help a second time, partly because I didn't want to be an excessive burden on any individual or church, and partly because I wasn't sure that they would have said "yes" if I had done so. (Not that they aren't generous people, but their financial limitations had been apparent to me from the time when I started attending that church.) I hated having to accept charity from my church, but I would have hated being thrown out into the street even more, so I was grateful that my pastor saw my need and responded to that need.
Nevertheless, if I hadn't gotten the job I have now, it seems likely that I would have been in serious trouble. After all, it's not as if I was living in luxurious digs to begin with. When you've been evicted from an inner city YMCA because you can't pay your rent, you know that you've gotten pretty close to rock bottom, and you know that the chances of finding another landlord willing to rent to you are extremely slim.
My phone surveyor job does not allow me the option of working a full-time,40-hour work week, but I could have had a work schedule of as many as 35 hours if I'd so chosen. It might seem as though I should have chosen to work the full 35 hours available to me, but there were a couple of reasons I didn't choose to do so (although I may still do so in the future, if necessary).
One reason was that the person who taught the training class I took told us that she highly advised that we limit our shifts to 30 hours a week initially. In my experience, it was good advice. The job can be pretty intense in the sense that it requires one's full attention from the moment one clocks in to the moment one clocks out.
Back to Introduction
HEALTH ISSUES
It didn't help that I went through a period of several months last year in which I was experiencing a lot of dental pain which made it much harder to concentrate on the job. That front tooth still needs work, although the pain eventually diminished considerably after at least a couple of months of constantly dabbing Anbesol on it whenever the pain became almost unbearable.
During the past week, I've experienced additional dental issues as a result of the fact that a crown put in by a dentist some time ago recently fell off. The remaining part of the tooth is so sharp that talking on the phone has recently been very uncomfortable, and sometimes downright painful, for me.
Dental insurance? What dental insurance? The company I work for provides virtually nothing in the way of job benefits such as health insurance or paid vacations. Having had jobs in the past which did provide such benefits, I definitely wish that my current job offered such benefits as well. But one takes what one can get when jobs get scarce.
This fall, not long after my dental pain had begun to subside, I caught a cold which seemed to be going around. I've finally gotten over that cold, thank the Lord, but it took a very long time to do so. Despite the ample use of sanitary wipes when starting every work shift, a large room full of roughly 100 telephone surveyors is a place where colds are easily spread from one person to another. A cold may seem like a trivial thing, but when one makes one's living talking on the phone, constantly coughing and hacking and sneezing can be a real trial.
And of course, there have been issues pertaining to high blood pressure and to the fact that I've been need of a hernia operation for several years now.
Now, I don't want to leave the impression that I spent all of 2006 suffering from various ailments, because that isn't the case. And I certainly ought to acknowledge that my health issues may seem trivial to some people suffering from life threatening or debillitating health problems far worse than mine. In fact, if it weren't for the fact that I have inadequate money with which to deal with these issues, the health issues I'm experiencing might seem relatively trivial.
As a conservative Christian, I generally tend to vote for candidates who oppose legal abortion and other things I consider to be bad for society. But I admit that I am inclined to support the idea of "universal health care" (provided that some of its shortcomings are addressed), for obvious reasons.
Back to Introduction
MY OTHER BLOG (NOW DELETED)
Another thing that occupied my time during the first half of 2006, after getting my new job, was that I set up a second blog at a site hosted by LifeWithChrist.org. Unlike the blogs I've written at this site, I got a lot of traffic and comments on that site. I'd begun to feel that I'd found a loving community of fellow Christians. The positive feedback I got about many of the articles I'd written made me feel very good. Previously, I'd felt pretty cut off from the Christian community (even when I was regularly going to church). The blog gave me the chance to communicate some ideas I'd been wanting to share with others for a very long time.
Eventually, things went kind of sour for me, to the point that I deliberately deleted my Life with Christ blog and washed my hands of it, but I don't regret the time I spent on that blog. I like to think that I planted some seeds of good thoughts which will eventually bear positive fruit.
The time I spent working on that blog was motivated by a number of factors. One of the primary factors was that I hoped to be able to establish connections with people in order to communicate my vision for an ambitious Christian ministry of the arts to be known as the Christian Artists' Resource Center.
Back to Introduction
THE CHRISTIAN ARTISTS' RESOURCE CENTER
There isn't adequate space here to describe my vision for the Christian Artists' Resource Center, so if you're interested in the idea of a comprehensive Christian ministry of the arts, I invite you to open and print and read the following PDF files (if you have Adobe Acrobat Reader or another program capable of opening PDF files):
Proposal re: the Christian Artists' Resource Center
To Do List re: the Christian Artists' Resource Center
I believe that once I am able to implement my plans for the website for the Christian Artists' Resource Center, I can begin to make at least part of my living by selling a variety of products I have created (such as full-color flower & garden photos to be sold in the form of fine art prints, greeting cards and other projects), as well as products I'll create on commission (such as pen & ink portraits based on people's photographic portraits), using an e-commerce website I have been planning to set up for the Christian Artists' Resource Center.
(To see an online gallery of my flower & garden photos, please visit this web page. Keep in mind that the web hosting for that site is free, and I don't have any control over the contents over the banner ads on the site.)
I've registered the domain name www.artisticchristians.com, and I've paid for hosting services which won't expire or need renewal until August 2006. That's the address (or one of the addresses) which I plan to use for the website for the Christian Artists' Resource Center.
My plans for that web site go far beyond merely meeting my own material needs by selling my art and photos on the site. I also hope to develop it into a web site (and, eventually, a far more comprehensive ministry) which will benefit many other artistically talented Christians as well.
If you take the time to read the preceding "to do" list, you will soon understand why I say that setting up such a web site and doing the many other things I felt needed to be done in order to turn my vision for the Christian Artists' Resource Center into a reality is and will be a very time consuming project. (And I've added many more items to that "to do" list since that time, as a result of things I've learned via my ongoing research into the project and its requirements.)
I still feel that that's a goal I need to pursue. I've gotten some very positive feedback about the project from some very well-known and talented Christians working in the arts.
In helping me in my time of temporary crisis, you will also be investing in the possibility that the vision expressed in the "first draft" PDF files listed above will come to pass.
MORE ABOUT ME
If you still feel that you need to know more about me in order to persuade you that I am a person who is sincere about serving the Lord, I would invite you to read earlier articles in this blog (such as this article about drinking water and Christian missions), and to visit my other website at www.markpettigrew.com, and to write to me if there are any things which aren't answered in the process of doing so.
Back to Introduction
THE CHASE
O.K., either you're the type of person who has a short attention span and/or very limited time (in which case you probably skipped most of the previous paragraphs), or else you've read the preceding information. Either way, the bottom line is this:
Tonight, I reached into my "fannie pack" and discovered something that really shook me up: My wallet was gone, along with all the ID cards in the wallet at the time and approximately $600. Ouch!!!
Was my pocket picked? Did I inadvertently lose the wallet in some other way? Frankly, I'm not sure. I've tried retracing my steps, and thoroughly searching my apartment, but so far, I haven't been able to find the wallet or its contents.
To some people, $600 is a small amount of money, but not for me. My take home pay for two four-week pay periods is slightly less than $1,000, and that's assuming that I qualify for the bonus my company offers for extra productivity on the phones. (I have good reason to believe that I won't qualify for that bonus when receiving my next paycheck.) In short, I'm pretty much living from paycheck to paycheck, with only a small amount of extra money with which to pay for an occasional luxury such as a cappuccino at McDonalds. I haven't had a working TV set in 2 years, because replacing the broken TV just hasn't been my highest priority.
Fortunately, I do still have my ATM debit card, so I don't have to worry about a thief using that card to access the money I do have in my checking account, but that money is very limited. It should keep me fed for the next week or two, but it won't do much more than that. And rent is due soon.
What I need is to raise some emergency funds, fast. I don't want to ask for exhorbitant amounts of money from anyone. But if I could get a one-time donation of just $10 from 60 different people or churches --- preferably from people who share my values and goals --- that would replace the lost and/or stolen money.
Now, I know what you're probably thinking: Hey, dummy, what were you doing carrying $600 or so around in your wallet? Well, I'd just cashed my paycheck recently at the bank down the street, and I hadn't yet gotten around to depositing the money in my own bank. Ironically, right before the incident happened, I'd been planning to do just that, because it occurred to me that losing the wallet could create major problems for me.
As for the question of any "carelessness" which might theoretically have led to the loss and/or theft of my wallet, please don't go there. Believe me, I'm probably going to be beating myself up over this for a long time, so there's no need for anyone else to remind me that I might possibly still have the wallet if I'd been more careful.
If you're wondering why I provided the preceding background information about myself prior to adding this section, it's simply that I felt that it was necessary in order to help readers to better appreciate why I am in the position of needing to ask for help, and why I feel that I deserve such help (to the extent that anyone deserves charitable help).
Of course, if you're the type of person who doesn't share my interest in achieving the goals stated here, then you would have no particular reason to think that I deserved help any more than anyone else. It's all a question of what's most important to you.
Back to Introduction
MY CONTACT INFORMATION
Mark Pettigrew
30 W. Chicago Avenue
Room 1212
Chicago, IL 60610
(773) 509-8126 (Voice Mail) or (312) 643-1336 (Home Phone)
mark_w_pettigrew@hotmail.com
(Those are underscores in-between the first name, middle initial and last name.)
Back to Introduction
SOME CONCLUDING COMMENTS ABOUT FAITH (and the LACK THEREOF)
It would be wonderful if we Christians had all reached a state of perfection where we walked in perfect obedience to the Lord and perfect faith in the Lord. The reality, though, is that we're all works in progress.
In many respects, I think I've lived a morally exemplary life. I've never used illegal drugs. I've never been drunk. And believe it or not, I'm still a virgin at age 50. (Fun? No, not especially. But then again, I don't ever have to worry about STD's or AIDS or unwanted pregnancies caused by my actions. I like to think that my obedience to God in that area will eventually prove to be a blessing for me in other ways as well.)
So do I think I've achieved perfection? What, are you kidding? I know my weaknesses all too well.
Having trouble trusting God to provide me with my needs in stressful times such as these is very close to the top of the list of my imperfections. I still become fearful when it looks as if I may lose my home or be unable to pay for essential living expenses or be forced to resign myself to never achieving my career goals. In times like these, I want to have faith, but it isn't always easy.
So regardless of whether or not you respond to this plea with any type of financial help, I would greatly appreciate your prayers. I've survived worse crises than this one, but I'm tired of dealing with setback after setback after setback. I want to make a real positive difference in this world, and it would be much easier to do so if I had adequate material resources with which to meet my needs and with which to invest in the attainment of my goals.
Back to Introduction
POSTSCRIPT: If you feel that you ought to get something in exchange for your donation, I'm willing to discuss the option of selling you one or more prints based on the flower & garden photos shown on this web page. I have digital files on CD-R disc for all of those images, and I can easily take them next door to Wolf Camera to make prints from those files. I can easily make 8x10 photo prints of those images and then send out the prints in standard Priority Mail envelopes ($4 for shipping and handling) at the post office.
If you would like a print of one or more of those images, just send me an e-mail message to that effect and let me know which image or images you want to order (specified by the number shown beneath each image). Then as soon as I receive your money order in the amount of $25 for each print, I'll have the print made from my digital file and I'll ship it to you. (The price of $25 would be so that I can make somewhere between $10 to $15 from each print sale after deducting the cost of making the print and the cost of the postage).
If you're thinking that this is a pretty amateurish way for me to sell my photo prints, well, you're right. Believe me, it isn't the way I wanted to do things. I have much more professional plans in the works for the future. But right now, I really could use some help.
Back to Introduction
Introduction
Background Information
Health Issues
My Other Blog
The Christian Artists' Resource Center
More About Me
The Chase
My Contact Information
Concluding Comments
Postscript Re: Print Sales
INTRODUCTION
Have you ever had an iron anvil dropped on your head? Neither have I, but I think I have a pretty good idea what it would feel like, because I've felt that way a number of times in my life, and I feel that way now. I'm writing this blog article in order to explain why that is the case.
Now, you may be from the "cut to the chase" school, and you may just want to know what the main topic of the blog is all about. Well, that's why they make scroll bars and internal links and anchors. You don't have to read this entire blog post if you don't want to do so.
You can scroll to the bottom of the post right away (or click "the chase") and you can get all of the basic information you need without bothering to get any background information which would help you to put this urgent plea into its proper context.
I'm providing preliminary background information for the sake of those who are inclined to be skeptical about pleas for help, and who feel that they need to know a lot more before they will donate anything to help a person in need.
Back to Introduction
BACKGROUND INFORMATION
If you've read all of the other blog posts on this site, then you know that my primary passion in life is using my artistic talents (as a musician, writer, poet, photographer, pen & ink portrait artist, digital artist and more) as a means of doing the best I can to serve the Lord Jesus Christ.
Unfortunately, achieving the goal of making a full time living pursuing that passion has been much easier said than done. Consequently, I have struggled with finances for a substantial portion of my life, and I've often found myself working at jobs which paid poorly and which had little or nothing to do with my passion.
For the past nine months, I have been working about 30 hours a week as a telephone surveyor. It is hardly what I would describe as my dream job, but I desperately needed a job when I was hired there in the middle of February 2006, and I couldn't afford to be very choosy. Since losing my job as a legal assistant in the middle of October 2005, I had been unemployed, with the exception of a couple of very brief temp assignments doing office work.
I'd been very active in my job search, particularly in terms of responding to classified ads I had found at CraigsList, but I hadn't managed to find an office job despite my numerous job skills, which included a typing speed of 65 to 70 wpm, as well as fluency in Microsoft Word and Access (with more limited knowledge of Excel and Powerpoint).
What's worse, my former boss had successfully challenged my application for unemployment insurance benefits, and I'd never made a huge amount of money at that job to begin with, so I had very little money to live on. I was beginning to get desperate.
I might have been evicted from my apartment for non-payment of rent if it had not been for a monetary gift which I received from the church I was attending (and still sometimes attend). But that money only went so far. I didn't want to have to go to that church and ask for similar help a second time, partly because I didn't want to be an excessive burden on any individual or church, and partly because I wasn't sure that they would have said "yes" if I had done so. (Not that they aren't generous people, but their financial limitations had been apparent to me from the time when I started attending that church.) I hated having to accept charity from my church, but I would have hated being thrown out into the street even more, so I was grateful that my pastor saw my need and responded to that need.
Nevertheless, if I hadn't gotten the job I have now, it seems likely that I would have been in serious trouble. After all, it's not as if I was living in luxurious digs to begin with. When you've been evicted from an inner city YMCA because you can't pay your rent, you know that you've gotten pretty close to rock bottom, and you know that the chances of finding another landlord willing to rent to you are extremely slim.
My phone surveyor job does not allow me the option of working a full-time,
One reason was that the person who taught the training class I took told us that she highly advised that we limit our shifts to 30 hours a week initially. In my experience, it was good advice. The job can be pretty intense in the sense that it requires one's full attention from the moment one clocks in to the moment one clocks out.
Back to Introduction
HEALTH ISSUES
It didn't help that I went through a period of several months last year in which I was experiencing a lot of dental pain which made it much harder to concentrate on the job. That front tooth still needs work, although the pain eventually diminished considerably after at least a couple of months of constantly dabbing Anbesol on it whenever the pain became almost unbearable.
During the past week, I've experienced additional dental issues as a result of the fact that a crown put in by a dentist some time ago recently fell off. The remaining part of the tooth is so sharp that talking on the phone has recently been very uncomfortable, and sometimes downright painful, for me.
Dental insurance? What dental insurance? The company I work for provides virtually nothing in the way of job benefits such as health insurance or paid vacations. Having had jobs in the past which did provide such benefits, I definitely wish that my current job offered such benefits as well. But one takes what one can get when jobs get scarce.
This fall, not long after my dental pain had begun to subside, I caught a cold which seemed to be going around. I've finally gotten over that cold, thank the Lord, but it took a very long time to do so. Despite the ample use of sanitary wipes when starting every work shift, a large room full of roughly 100 telephone surveyors is a place where colds are easily spread from one person to another. A cold may seem like a trivial thing, but when one makes one's living talking on the phone, constantly coughing and hacking and sneezing can be a real trial.
And of course, there have been issues pertaining to high blood pressure and to the fact that I've been need of a hernia operation for several years now.
Now, I don't want to leave the impression that I spent all of 2006 suffering from various ailments, because that isn't the case. And I certainly ought to acknowledge that my health issues may seem trivial to some people suffering from life threatening or debillitating health problems far worse than mine. In fact, if it weren't for the fact that I have inadequate money with which to deal with these issues, the health issues I'm experiencing might seem relatively trivial.
As a conservative Christian, I generally tend to vote for candidates who oppose legal abortion and other things I consider to be bad for society. But I admit that I am inclined to support the idea of "universal health care" (provided that some of its shortcomings are addressed), for obvious reasons.
Back to Introduction
MY OTHER BLOG (NOW DELETED)
Another thing that occupied my time during the first half of 2006, after getting my new job, was that I set up a second blog at a site hosted by LifeWithChrist.org. Unlike the blogs I've written at this site, I got a lot of traffic and comments on that site. I'd begun to feel that I'd found a loving community of fellow Christians. The positive feedback I got about many of the articles I'd written made me feel very good. Previously, I'd felt pretty cut off from the Christian community (even when I was regularly going to church). The blog gave me the chance to communicate some ideas I'd been wanting to share with others for a very long time.
Eventually, things went kind of sour for me, to the point that I deliberately deleted my Life with Christ blog and washed my hands of it, but I don't regret the time I spent on that blog. I like to think that I planted some seeds of good thoughts which will eventually bear positive fruit.
The time I spent working on that blog was motivated by a number of factors. One of the primary factors was that I hoped to be able to establish connections with people in order to communicate my vision for an ambitious Christian ministry of the arts to be known as the Christian Artists' Resource Center.
Back to Introduction
THE CHRISTIAN ARTISTS' RESOURCE CENTER
There isn't adequate space here to describe my vision for the Christian Artists' Resource Center, so if you're interested in the idea of a comprehensive Christian ministry of the arts, I invite you to open and print and read the following PDF files (if you have Adobe Acrobat Reader or another program capable of opening PDF files):
Proposal re: the Christian Artists' Resource Center
To Do List re: the Christian Artists' Resource Center
I believe that once I am able to implement my plans for the website for the Christian Artists' Resource Center, I can begin to make at least part of my living by selling a variety of products I have created (such as full-color flower & garden photos to be sold in the form of fine art prints, greeting cards and other projects), as well as products I'll create on commission (such as pen & ink portraits based on people's photographic portraits), using an e-commerce website I have been planning to set up for the Christian Artists' Resource Center.
(To see an online gallery of my flower & garden photos, please visit this web page. Keep in mind that the web hosting for that site is free, and I don't have any control over the contents over the banner ads on the site.)
I've registered the domain name www.artisticchristians.com, and I've paid for hosting services which won't expire or need renewal until August 2006. That's the address (or one of the addresses) which I plan to use for the website for the Christian Artists' Resource Center.
My plans for that web site go far beyond merely meeting my own material needs by selling my art and photos on the site. I also hope to develop it into a web site (and, eventually, a far more comprehensive ministry) which will benefit many other artistically talented Christians as well.
If you take the time to read the preceding "to do" list, you will soon understand why I say that setting up such a web site and doing the many other things I felt needed to be done in order to turn my vision for the Christian Artists' Resource Center into a reality is and will be a very time consuming project. (And I've added many more items to that "to do" list since that time, as a result of things I've learned via my ongoing research into the project and its requirements.)
I still feel that that's a goal I need to pursue. I've gotten some very positive feedback about the project from some very well-known and talented Christians working in the arts.
In helping me in my time of temporary crisis, you will also be investing in the possibility that the vision expressed in the "first draft" PDF files listed above will come to pass.
MORE ABOUT ME
If you still feel that you need to know more about me in order to persuade you that I am a person who is sincere about serving the Lord, I would invite you to read earlier articles in this blog (such as this article about drinking water and Christian missions), and to visit my other website at www.markpettigrew.com, and to write to me if there are any things which aren't answered in the process of doing so.
Back to Introduction
THE CHASE
O.K., either you're the type of person who has a short attention span and/or very limited time (in which case you probably skipped most of the previous paragraphs), or else you've read the preceding information. Either way, the bottom line is this:
Tonight, I reached into my "fannie pack" and discovered something that really shook me up: My wallet was gone, along with all the ID cards in the wallet at the time and approximately $600. Ouch!!!
Was my pocket picked? Did I inadvertently lose the wallet in some other way? Frankly, I'm not sure. I've tried retracing my steps, and thoroughly searching my apartment, but so far, I haven't been able to find the wallet or its contents.
To some people, $600 is a small amount of money, but not for me. My take home pay for two four-week pay periods is slightly less than $1,000, and that's assuming that I qualify for the bonus my company offers for extra productivity on the phones. (I have good reason to believe that I won't qualify for that bonus when receiving my next paycheck.) In short, I'm pretty much living from paycheck to paycheck, with only a small amount of extra money with which to pay for an occasional luxury such as a cappuccino at McDonalds. I haven't had a working TV set in 2 years, because replacing the broken TV just hasn't been my highest priority.
Fortunately, I do still have my ATM debit card, so I don't have to worry about a thief using that card to access the money I do have in my checking account, but that money is very limited. It should keep me fed for the next week or two, but it won't do much more than that. And rent is due soon.
What I need is to raise some emergency funds, fast. I don't want to ask for exhorbitant amounts of money from anyone. But if I could get a one-time donation of just $10 from 60 different people or churches --- preferably from people who share my values and goals --- that would replace the lost and/or stolen money.
Now, I know what you're probably thinking: Hey, dummy, what were you doing carrying $600 or so around in your wallet? Well, I'd just cashed my paycheck recently at the bank down the street, and I hadn't yet gotten around to depositing the money in my own bank. Ironically, right before the incident happened, I'd been planning to do just that, because it occurred to me that losing the wallet could create major problems for me.
As for the question of any "carelessness" which might theoretically have led to the loss and/or theft of my wallet, please don't go there. Believe me, I'm probably going to be beating myself up over this for a long time, so there's no need for anyone else to remind me that I might possibly still have the wallet if I'd been more careful.
If you're wondering why I provided the preceding background information about myself prior to adding this section, it's simply that I felt that it was necessary in order to help readers to better appreciate why I am in the position of needing to ask for help, and why I feel that I deserve such help (to the extent that anyone deserves charitable help).
Of course, if you're the type of person who doesn't share my interest in achieving the goals stated here, then you would have no particular reason to think that I deserved help any more than anyone else. It's all a question of what's most important to you.
Back to Introduction
MY CONTACT INFORMATION
Mark Pettigrew
30 W. Chicago Avenue
Room 1212
Chicago, IL 60610
(773) 509-8126 (Voice Mail) or (312) 643-1336 (Home Phone)
mark_w_pettigrew@hotmail.com
(Those are underscores in-between the first name, middle initial and last name.)
Back to Introduction
SOME CONCLUDING COMMENTS ABOUT FAITH (and the LACK THEREOF)
It would be wonderful if we Christians had all reached a state of perfection where we walked in perfect obedience to the Lord and perfect faith in the Lord. The reality, though, is that we're all works in progress.
In many respects, I think I've lived a morally exemplary life. I've never used illegal drugs. I've never been drunk. And believe it or not, I'm still a virgin at age 50. (Fun? No, not especially. But then again, I don't ever have to worry about STD's or AIDS or unwanted pregnancies caused by my actions. I like to think that my obedience to God in that area will eventually prove to be a blessing for me in other ways as well.)
So do I think I've achieved perfection? What, are you kidding? I know my weaknesses all too well.
Having trouble trusting God to provide me with my needs in stressful times such as these is very close to the top of the list of my imperfections. I still become fearful when it looks as if I may lose my home or be unable to pay for essential living expenses or be forced to resign myself to never achieving my career goals. In times like these, I want to have faith, but it isn't always easy.
So regardless of whether or not you respond to this plea with any type of financial help, I would greatly appreciate your prayers. I've survived worse crises than this one, but I'm tired of dealing with setback after setback after setback. I want to make a real positive difference in this world, and it would be much easier to do so if I had adequate material resources with which to meet my needs and with which to invest in the attainment of my goals.
Back to Introduction
POSTSCRIPT: If you feel that you ought to get something in exchange for your donation, I'm willing to discuss the option of selling you one or more prints based on the flower & garden photos shown on this web page. I have digital files on CD-R disc for all of those images, and I can easily take them next door to Wolf Camera to make prints from those files. I can easily make 8x10 photo prints of those images and then send out the prints in standard Priority Mail envelopes ($4 for shipping and handling) at the post office.
If you would like a print of one or more of those images, just send me an e-mail message to that effect and let me know which image or images you want to order (specified by the number shown beneath each image). Then as soon as I receive your money order in the amount of $25 for each print, I'll have the print made from my digital file and I'll ship it to you. (The price of $25 would be so that I can make somewhere between $10 to $15 from each print sale after deducting the cost of making the print and the cost of the postage).
If you're thinking that this is a pretty amateurish way for me to sell my photo prints, well, you're right. Believe me, it isn't the way I wanted to do things. I have much more professional plans in the works for the future. But right now, I really could use some help.
Back to Introduction
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