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Stories of Faith for Inspiration and Proof that God can be Trusted Completely

The following is a true story . . .

My friend screamed. Opening my eyes–I screamed!  My friend yanked the steering wheel to put our truck back on the road as we narrowly missed a telephone pole. We’d left late in the evening from Columbus, Ohio, in a small truck packed with used clothes for a mission in Cucumber Mountain, West Virginia.  It was 3 AM in the dark winding woods, and I’d fallen asleep at the wheel; my sleeping friend awoke just in the nick of time!  We were shaken, but thanked the Lord for keeping us safe!

Cucumber Mountain is a tiny hamlet buried in the bottom of the West Virginia mountains in McDowell County.  At that time, McDowell County was the poorest county in the country.  Most of the coal mines had shut down and there was little industry in the area.  Families that had been coal miners for several generations were now struggling on government support.  It was an isolated area where one had to drive down into Virginia and back up into West Virginia to get to the mission.

We finally arrived and slept in the truck till morning when the old mountain missionary came and beat on our truck to wake us.  “Take the clothes up to that small shed and pile them beside the other clothes on the racks, and then we’ll have breakfast.”  She sold the used clothes to the local folks for ten cents or a quarter.  While eating breakfast, I asked her, “Why do you sell the clothes when the folks are so poor?”  “Well, I used to give the clothes away, but folks didn’t take care of the clothes, and I’d see them lying in the yards or being used for rags, but I discovered if I sell the clothes to them, then the clothes become their property that they value, and they take care of them!”   She smiled and shoveled another fork of corn mush in her mouth.

This old mountain missionary had been a gentle, single woman who had moved to these mountains and had been helping folks in the name of Jesus for the last thirty laborious years.  Those years had turned her into a tough, no-nonsense-in-your-face, mountain woman with a great sense of humor who loved Jesus and the people she served.

On a later trip down to her mission, three of us brought another load of clothes.  She decided to take the three of us for a ride in her old four-wheel-drive Land Rover back into a “hollow,” an isolated section of the valley.  “I’m taking you boys to see a family I work with, and they just got electricity for the first time and are real proud of it!  They are touchy about strangers, though, because of the amount of “moonshine” made in these mountains, so stay with me and don’t go wandering off, or you might get shot!”  We learned later that there was no real law enforcement down there, and folks took care of things themselves.  The week before, a man was caught with another man’s wife and was chained to the back of a truck and drug around the mountains.

After driving over pitted mud roads and up a dry creek bed, we reach the house.  The first thing we noticed was their electricity.  They had one light bulb hanging from a wire over the front porch.  Nothing else in the home was powered by electricity–only the porch!  While she visited with the family, my friends and I stood out in the dirt-covered yard by the car.  Sitting on a pile of rocks, we saw two grimy little boys about five and eight years old.  Both had big wads of chewing tobacco bulging from their left cheeks and were spitting “tobaccie juice” on the rocks.  I walked over and whispered in the older boy’s ear, “You see my skinny friend over there; if you can spit some juice on his shoe, I’ll give you a quarter!”  With a grin, he went after my friend.  Five minutes later after chasing my friend around the yard, I paid up–the kid was a good shot!

That evening back at the mission, after washing my hands in the brown and black mineral stained sink, I asked the old mountain missionary why there was hardly any water pressure and barely enough water to wash my hands.  She said, “The well is at the bottom of the mountain, so by the time it gets up here, there isn’t much pressure.  Years back, a group of Mennonite men stopped in and built me a water storage tank.  The pump at the well would send a low volume of water up during the night and fill my storage tank; then all day long I had plenty of water and water pressure, but the plumbing went bad about six months ago, and what I have now is what I have–a trickle of water.”  Having done some plumbing in the past, I asked her if I could look at the problem.

Upon exposing the pipes, I saw the problem right off.  It would take a one-half inch cast iron tee, a union, an end cap, two ninety-degree elbows, and two six-inch pipes threaded on each end.  But we had a problem.  The three of us would be leaving early the next morning back to Columbus, Ohio.  The nearest town was War, and with the rugged roads, it would be impossible to get there before it closed.  So we were stuck.  But the old mountain missionary lady closed her eyes and prayed, “Lord!  You brought a man here to fix my plumbing, and he needs some parts.  Can you do something about that?  Thank you!”  She opened her eyes and smiled.

She said, “You know the little shed up the hill where you put them clothes you brought?  Well, years ago, a lady stopped by and made me some nice sturdy clothes racks out of plumbing parts.  Go up and see if there is anything you can use.”  I climbed up the hill, entered the shed, pulled back the tightly packed clothes on the rack and stared dumb-founded.  At the end of the half-inch cast iron pipe clothes rack was a tee, a union, an end cap, two ninety-degree elbows, and two six-inch short pipes threaded on each end!

I disassembled the clothes rack for the parts and a few hours later, this faithful old mountain missionary was thrilled because her water was working again.  And through her simple prayer, the three of us were blessed and humbled by the no-nonsense-in-your-face love of God.

“Listen, my dear brothers: Has not God chosen those who are poor in the eyes of the world to be rich in faith and to inherit the kingdom he promised those who love him?” — James 2:5 NIV

Copyright © 2010 by William D. (Nick) Nichols

The following is a true story . . .

I will never forget The Voice.  Climbing up the steep steps to my college library that cold December morning, my thoughts were on the paper I needed to do research for.  The library was just opening, and I was alone on the steps.  Suddenly my ears are jarred by this very loud and authoritative voice!  “I want you to go to Canadian Bible College this coming semester and for the following year.”  It was so loud I thought my friends might be playing a joke on me, so I glanced behind the tall bushes by the steps.  As I looked, my heart was telling me I had just heard God, the Creator of the Universe, verbally speak to me!  Almost like Moses at the burning bush I said, “But Lord . . . Nobody applies to go to another college in two weeks’ time!!”  He was silent, and I got the message.

It was two weeks before the end of the semester and Christmas break at my upstate New York college.  The only thing I knew about Canadian Bible College was that my roommate had a brochure lying on his desk from them.  I had never heard of the school before and didn’t even know where it was located in Canada.  The memory of The Voice compelled me onward, and I asked my roommate if I could have the brochure with its attached response card.  I filled in my name, home address, and said, “Here goes Lord,” and dropped it in the mail.

The school I discovered was located in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada–1,500 miles from my home in Columbus, Ohio.  This was back in the ’70s when there was a severe energy shortage when cars were backed up for blocks trying to get gas.  The airlines were having the same problem.  Before leaving New York, I went to a travel agent to buy a round-trip ticket to Regina.  I was told, because of the shortage, I could only purchase a one-way ticket to Regina, and I got the only seat they had left.  So, in total faith, I purchased the ticket and went back home to Columbus for Christmas break.

At home waiting for me was the enrollment package from Canadian Bible College.  I quickly completed the package and sent it to the school.  As Christmas break drew to a close, I still hadn’t heard anything from the new school.  I looked at the ticket I had already purchased wondering if I had done the right thing.  Here it was the day before I was to leave for Regina, so I prayed, “Ok Lord, you told me to go, and I’m gonna go, but if I get stuck, it’s up to you to get me unstuck!”  Later that day, I received my one and only ever Western Union Telegram saying I had been accepted at Canadian Bible College for the coming semester!

The next day my cute girlfriend (later my wife) drove me to the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, airport to fly to Regina.  That was the closest airport we could fly out of because of the energy shortage.  It was an unseasonably balmy 50 degrees for a day in January.  Saying our goodbyes, I boarded the plane still trusting the Lord.  The Regina airport back then had an old-fashioned design–the plane would land and stop on the runway, and then the passengers would disembark, walk across the runway in the open to the terminal.  Shortly after crossing the northern U.S.-Canadian border, our plane landed; I stepped out of the plane and was stunned!  With the wind chill factor, it was 50 degrees BELOW ZERO!  A 100-degree drop in temperature was a real shocker to my system!  It was a very long distance to that terminal, and my parka was in my luggage; I was the only person running and yelling all the way to the terminal!

After I got my composure and folks around me stopped laughing, I called a taxi.  By the time the taxi came, it was dark outside.  I shared my travel story with the taxi driver and the story of how I came to know Jesus.  When we arrived at the school, she was crying a bit; I prayed with her and she only charged me half price.  Now, there I was–standing in front of the school.  I walked in the front door and saw a light on my left coming from what seemed to be a small bookstore.  It was the day before the students were to arrive, all 200 of them, and a lady was diligently organizing a pile of textbooks.

In my happy, cheerful voice, I loudly said, “Hi!,” and the poor old lady nearly jumped over a chair!  I announced to her, “The Lord told me to come here, so now that I’m here, what do I do?”  After she recovered, she said she was in the process of closing the bookstore, but would call the Dean of Men first and tell him I was here.  She did that, turned off the lights, said, “Goodbye,” and left.  I was left standing in the darkened building with just the dim security lights lit.  Out of nowhere I heard the tapping of footsteps, and in the dim light about thirty feet away, a girl stopped and stared at me.  With the lighting and shadows, she almost looked like a ghost!  As we stared at each other, she asked, “Are you Nicky from Columbus, Ohio!”  I was shocked!  This living apparition knew my name!!

It turned out she had been on a missions trip to Thailand the summer before with my girlfriend and recognized me from her pictures!  On top of that, she said that she worked in Admissions, and when she saw my late application come in, she connected my name from my girlfriend‘s conversations, and so put my application at the head of the pile of applications.  Now I knew how I got accepted so quickly into the school.  While we were talking, the Dean of Men showed up, and we headed over to the men’s dorm.

On the way, he said he couldn’t figure out how I got accepted because every bed in the dorm was filled.  He said, “For now, I’ll just put you in one of the guy’s rooms for the night, and when the rest of the students show up tomorrow, we’ll try to find a place for you off campus.”  While walking down the hall between the dorm rooms, this skinny Canadian guy comes up to the Dean of Men and says, “Dean, my roommate just left and said he wouldn’t be back for this semester.”  The Dean looked at me, looked at the skinny guy, then said to me, “Meet your new roommate!”  Clearly, “The Voice” of God had spoken to me as He went before me and “made a way, where there seemed to be no way.”

“And my God will supply all your needs according to His riches in glory in Christ Jesus.” — Philippians 4:19 NAS  (B.B)

Post Script: One other little thing.  When I arrived at the college, I had ZERO money to pay for the semester.  Since the Lord told me to go and had worked out everything else for me to be there, I figured He would take care of the money as well.  When they asked me how I wanted to pay for the semester, I smiled and chuckled saying, “Good question; I have no clue!”  When they learned I had done maintenance work in the past, they put me on a maintenance crew.  I shoveled a lot of snow that winter and did other things around the college, and at the end of the semester, I walked away with nothing owed.  PTL!!!  Oh, and by-the-way, my new roommate and I became lifelong friends and are in frequent contact to this day.

The new manager seemed like a nice enough guy.  I never could have guessed he would turn into the “Manager from Hell!”

He came around and made all the formal introductions to his new employees.  We figured it would take him a couple of months to get settled into his new job.  During that time, life in the office continued as usual, but as the months passed and he got settled in, it became clear that there were some of us who were being unfairly targeted, while he chose a few favorite employees on which he lavished much attention.  However on those of us targeted, he lavished disdain, contempt, or complete indifference.  This caused a major rift in the office resulting in an ever-increasing undercurrent of murmuring and silent grumbling.

Personality-wise, he was a narcissist and proud of it!  To upper management, this guy could do no wrong–he was an adept butt-kisser.  As time marched on, he became focused on a handful of us as . . . his enemies.  We were just trying to do our jobs, and this guy starts undermining what we’re doing and stabbing us in the back in any way he can.  He was so good at it; he could attack us individually, and nobody else would even see him do it!  Work became a terrible and miserable place to be all because of HIM.  Life had become so stressful for me personally that I considered quitting my job after twenty plus years.  I complained to upper management, but with no response.  Work was becoming so unbearable, I could barely drag myself to work in the mornings.

Of course I prayed about all this, and there were some other believers on his enemy-list who were also praying that God would do something!  I used to eat my lunch in my office because by the time I got past security and out of the building, I only had about fifteen minutes before I would have to return, but because of how incendiary the office had become, I HAD to leave the building even if it was just for a few minutes.  One lunch break as I was standing outside in total despair across the street from our building, I saw a friend of mine coming in my direction.

This Christian brother had been our translator for our mission’s trip to Mexico a number of years back.  He saw me, smiled, and headed for me.  We only worked a few buildings away from each other and over the years kept saying we needed to go to lunch together, but it never happened.  Now, there he was.  After our initial greeting, he said, “Hey what’s wrong? You look like something is bothering you!”  I explained the situation.  He smiled again and said, “I know exactly how you feel!!  I had the same situation and prayed, and prayed that the Lord would change my manager, and He did!!  He gave me a new manager!  So keep trusting Jesus to deliver you, and He will!”

I walked back into the office encouraged, thanking the Lord for that timely meeting, and trusting Him more fully for my hopeless situation . . . only to have things get worse!!  I didn’t think that was even possible!  The guy, always in secret, started becoming physically hostile and threatening!  Not long after that, our office was given notice of an important upcoming meeting, and it involved most of us on our boss’s secret enemy-list which included all of us that had been desperately crying out to God for a solution.

The day of the meeting arrived, and as we walked in, we surmised it must be a very serious meeting because upper management, an attorney, and Union representatives were all present.  They matter-of-factly announced that due to some major program changes in the company, our office would be downsized.  Those employees affected by this downsizing and their skills were needed elsewhere in the company.  And you guessed it–those downsized employees included all of us who had been praying for a solution!!

In one fell swoop, God WHOOSHED us out from under this “Manager from Hell!”  All the decisions were made at the top of the company; our manager had absolutely no control over what happened.  In short order, we were all in new positions!!!  And, get this, in much better positions!  A powerful lesson for me to stop underestimating the effectiveness of prayer!

“The LORD protects the simple-hearted; when I was in great need, he saved me.”  — Psalms 116:6  NIV

Copyright © 2010 by William D. (Nick) Nichols