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I would like to share an interesting story with you and it has some twists and turns. A couple of years ago I bought a watch, the watch above, the Luminox ANU 4200. \u00a0ANU stands for Approved for Navy Use. \u00a0This is the watch that is given to BUDS graduates (Navy Seals)! \u00a0I found it on sale for a little under $400. and finally broke down and bought it. \u00a0I really like Luminox watches and have several. \u00a0I hate to admit I have several dozen watches, I just like them. \u00a0So I wore it for a few weeks and one morning in church a older member of our congregatio, \u00a0let’s call him Bob, was sitting one pew in front of me. I love Bob he is an ex-Marine, though he would say there is no such thing, “Once a Marine, always a Marine!” \u00a0Bob is in his late 80’s and wears a hat to church every Sunday covered with pins related to his Marine service.<\/p>\n
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So I’m sitting behind Bob staring at his Marine pins and the Lord spoke to me in my spirit, “You know you’re not a Marine, you never have been, but yet you’re wearing a fine watch made for a Marine, don’t you think Bob would like to have that watch?!” \u00a0For the rest of the service the Lord and I had little wrestling match which I was slowly loosing! \u00a0By the end of the service I knew what I \u00a0had to do and what I should do, and in fact what I wanted to do! \u00a0I approached Bob and asked him if he had a watch. \u00a0He said yes, and showed me an old square faced watch on his wrist. \u00a0I took the luminox off my wrist and handed it to him and said, I think God wants you to have this! \u00a0 I told him the Marine signifcance of the watch and he teared up and thanked me very humbly. \u00a0I said Bob, \u00a0“you served your country with great honor and distinction, you’re the kind of guy that should own this watch, not me!”<\/p>\n
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A couple of weeks ago Bob went home to the Lord and a bunch of Marine buddies that proceeded him in death. \u00a0It was a great loss for our church, community and for me personally. \u00a0I looked forward every Sunday to visitng with Bob, who was a character and always had a funny things to say! \u00a0After his death I called my Pastor and shared this story with him and aksed him if it would be inappropriate if I asked his wife if she would allow me to wear the watch in Bob’s memory. \u00a0He said he thought that was completley appropriate. \u00a0I called her explained that it was a gift and she was free to do anything she wished with the watch, but if she had no use for it, I would like to wear it and remember Bob that way. \u00a0She said she would like that, so this morning she brought it to church and told me that Bob showed it to everyone and told them the Marine significance of the time piece. \u00a0It is once again on my wrist and though I don’t deserve the honor that goes with it, I will wear it proudly knowing Bob, a real American hero once wore it, and earned that honor with his sacrifice and service.<\/p>\n
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On more than one occasion I wished I had it, but I knew it was where it should be! \u00a0 So it came full circle and I’m so glad I listened to my spirit when the Lord urged me to do what He urged me to do! \u00a0A part of me really did not want to part with it, but I felt the tug on my heart strings so strong that morning, I knew it was the right thing to do. \u00a0The look in his eyes confirmed it and his wife’s words when she handed it back to me this morning was further confirmation! \u00a0We don’t really own anything here, it all belongs to Him, and we need to share and distribute according to His instructions! \u00a0I’m so glad I did!<\/p>\n
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Obedience is better than sacrifice!<\/p>\n
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Blessings,<\/p>\n
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the pilgrim<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I would like to share an interesting story with you and it has some twists and turns. A couple of years ago I bought a watch, the watch above, the Luminox ANU 4200. \u00a0ANU stands for Approved for Navy Use. \u00a0This is the watch that is given to BUDS graduates (Navy Seals)! \u00a0I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20216","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20216","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20216"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20216\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20219,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20216\/revisions\/20219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20216"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20216"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/billfortney.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20216"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}