Howard Chrys - Faith Commander

ZONDERVAN

Faith Commander

Copyright 2014 by Korie Robertson and Chrys Howard

Requests for information should be addressed to:

Zondervan, 3900 Sparks Dr. SE, Grand Rapids, MI 49546

ePub Edition March 2014: ISBN 978-0-310-82353-7

All Scripture quotations are taken from The Holy Bible, New International Version, NIV. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

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Cover design: Grey Matter Group

Cover photography: Russell A. Graves

Interior design: David Conn

Printed in the United States of America

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1
REDONKULOUS FAITH

CHAPTER 2
RADICAL FORGIVENESS

CHAPTER 3
RAVENOUS PRAYER

CHAPTER 4
REAL OBEDIENCE

CHAPTER 5
ROWDY KINDNESS

W e would like to thank our friend and childrens minister, LinDee Loveland, for her incredible contribution to Willies Redneck Rodeo. She is a bottomless pit of great ideas and blesses our lives every day. Our children love Miss LinDee and we do too!

We would also like to thank Karen Lee-Thorp and Cindy Bultema. What a blessing to have such talented women help us on the Faith Commander adult and teen books (Karen), and childrens curriculum (Cindy). They caught the vision and ran with it. You both are amazing!

A special thank you to the video crew, T. J. Rathbun, Jay Irwin, and John Pottenger, who came to Louisiana to capture who the Robertsons really are.

And to Alan, Jase, Willie, Jep, Si, Phil, Reed, John Luke, Sadie, Cole, and Will who took time out of their busy lives to lend a voice to this project. You guys are awesome men of God, and Sadie, youre an awesome God-girl!

Thank you, John Raymond, for your faith in this project and for your desire to get it right for the sake of the adults and children who we pray will be blessed by it. You and your entire team have been amazing to work with. We couldnt have asked for a better experience.

EBOOK INSTRUCTIONS

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W e love a good story. In the Robertson family, about the time you start learning to tie your shoes is when you start listening to good stories. Later you get your chance to tell a good story. Our stories involve experiences we have gone through, taken from the ordinary things we deal with every day, but often made bigger than life to make them more fun. There may also be some surprise twists to keep you guessing. But the secret to a really good story is that it will have a point that will stay with you for the rest of your life.

Its no surprise, then, that we love Jesuss stories. He called them parables, which means they compare something to something else. Parables aim straight for the heart and can change yours if you let them. Think of a parable as an earthly story with a heavenly meaning from our Faith Commander: Jesus.

In this book were going to look at five of Jesuss parables. Were going to peel them back so you can feel how outrageous they were when Jesus first told them. Then were going to dig deep into what they tell us about how to live. Each parable deals with a value that is foundational to the way our family lives: faith, forgiveness, prayer, obedience, and kindness. Willie and I (Korie) both come from big families, and these five values are some of the main things that hold our families together. Well be telling some true stories about the Robertson family to show you how we try to live these values.

If youve heard these parables before, we hope youll let them hit you fresh. And if youve never heard them before, youre in for a treat. Not even Si can tell a better story than Jesus.

M y (Kories) in-laws, Miss Kay and Phil, set an example of faith that never stops amazing me. They got married when Miss Kay was just sixteen and Phil was seventeen. He headed off to Louisiana Tech University on a football scholarship, and she went with him. Being young was hard enough, but it was the 1960s, and college introduced Phil to drinking and drugs. When he was drunk he was angry, and Miss Kay was scared.

Their baby Alan was born, then Jase, then Willie. Phil kept drinking. In his twenties, Phil came to own a beer joint, and Miss Kay was a barmaid who didnt drink, fighting for her marriage while Phils behavior went out of control.

A man with a Bible came to see Phil at the bar, and Phil ran him off. Miss Kay, though, decided to entrust her life to God as things with Phil went from bad to worse. She told her boys, Thats not your daddy. Thats the devil in your daddy.

Phil got into a barroom brawl and fled to the woods to escape the law. Later he actually made Miss Kay and her boys move out of the family house because he said they were cramping his lifestyle. But Phil was miserable and wanted a way out of the drinking and anger. Eventually he took Miss Kays advice and sat down with the Bible-carrying pastor who had visited his bar.

Phil, what do you think the gospel is? the pastor asked.

I dont know, Phil said, gospel music on the radio?

The pastor explained to him how Jesus was born of a virgin, died on the cross, was buried, and was raised from the dead. Phil was blown away by the idea that Jesus died for him and was raised. They were sitting in the baptistery of the church, and Phil said, Im going to make Jesus the Lord of my life. I want to follow him from this day forward.

Miss Kay and the three boys were downstairs in the church, and they heard what Phil said. When Phil was baptized, the boys began hollering and shouting, My daddys saved! My daddys saved!

Phil was saved and in another way, the whole family was saved from the consequences of Phils old life.

It took a strength of faith that Mom and I call redonkulous for Miss Kay to hold onto her marriage for years until Phil took that step. It took a tiny seed of redonkulous faith for Phil to believe that the gospel of Jesus was reliable to set the direction of his new life. Phil trusted that what hed learned about Jesus was true, and as he began to act on it, his faith grew.

I love this story because it shows me how a tiny bit of real redonkulous faith can change everything. My life, and my husband Willies life, would be so different today if Miss Kay hadnt hung onto God and if Phil hadnt taken that first step.

Faith is the number-one value our family seeks to live by. Faith isnt just a church word; you and I use faith many times a day in the most ordinary situations. For instance, Miss Kay loves to cook, and when she cooks she follows a recipe. She has used her recipes over and over, and she has faith that when she puts all the ingredients together, the recipe will work. Even more, if she gets a new recipe from a friend, the first time she uses it she really has to have faith that the end result will taste good! Faith simply means