Now I am finally back home in Finland after being away for one month. Many of you have probably red about my trip from Vasa, Finland to Sölvesborg, Sweden where I attended the conference and bible school at Folkkyrkan together with pastor Tommy Lilja from where me and brother Reijo Ruotsalainen flew over to Houston, Texas where we hooked up with brothers and sisters from the Ambassadors For Jesus Christ motorcycle ministry and attended the Lonestar Rally in Galveston, Texas. In Texas I got the flu so I had to cancel the scheduled meetings in Kansas City and brother Reijo returned to Finland a couple of days before I left Texas for Lakeland, Florida where I had an awesome time at Ignited church where the outpouring started back in 2008. From Lakeland I drove to Port Charlotte to hook up with my brother Larry and since Port Charlotte I have not updated my blog and website, so here we go. You can read about all these places and happenings I just mentioned in the earlier blogs or if you want to read about it all in swedish, click HERE.
The east coast of Florida
From Port Charlotte I drove from coast to coast to Stuart on the east coast. I had booked a room there for the rest of my stay in USA and actually I am very happy with the place. I stayed at Sububan motel on the Federeal Highway with everything close by. The room was small, but nice and I had everything I needed.
I decided to stay one night at another motel in Lantana as I were scheduled to speak in the finnish pentecostal church in Lake Worth sunday november 21st. The motel 6 experience in Lantala was quite horrible due to mold, gun shooting, police sirens and screaming people. Sunday morning I found out that one of my Facebook friends, a brother in Christ Mike Eicher who is living up in Michigan were 30 minutes from where I was. I jumped in the car and drove down to Fort Lauderdale to meet him and his wife who were going out for a cruise. We have stayed in touch on Facebook for at least one year, brother Mike have both my book and the first album and just two weeks ago we spoke about that it would be nice to meet in person. This way GOD heard our prayers and connected us this wonderful sunday morning. We had a cup of coffee together at the beach and half an hour later I had to leave to make it to church in time.
At church it was really nice to hook up with pastor Petri Kosonen again and the first meeting this morning were in english. It felt good to be back at Kotikirkko and I had one more meeting to do at night, this one in finnish. Between the meetings I went to check out a motorcycle for a friend over here in Finland and before I had already bought one for another brother in the Lord. Now I had two bikes to ship to Finland and not only that, I also had two happy customers at home. Both were 1998´s and one is a Road King with lots of extras with 12000 original miles and the other one a Wide Glide with 17000 original miles. Really clean and good bikes. I am happy for the new owners and these bikes will be arriving to Finland later this winter.
The evening meeting in finnish at Kotikirkko was really good. There church were packed and what made my night was the fact that this church is really a blessing to so many people. The church choir sang in the beginning and the end and in the middle I gave my testimony, preached and sang some of my new songs. At the end of my set, the drummer and the bass player from the choir joined me together with pastor Petri on piano and the violin player and we really managed to rock up the old tune Amazing grace to something that brought revival feeling in the air.
It was such a blessing to see that the older and the younger generation did serve the Lord under the same roof. I highly respect the older generation that have been here before us and built up the churches we have today. What a blessing it is to listen to them giving praise to Jesus when they sing. I wish more churches could understand that all generations have to fit under the same roof and not everyone likes the new style worship, not everyone like the choir, not everyone like my songs.... in a church there need to be something for each and everyone, for you and for old. Thats how GOD wants it to be. Both Folkkyrkan in Sölvesborg and Kotikirkko in Lake Worth are good examples of renewal in love and faith. So wonderful to experience and the love of GOD were so strong that you almost could touch it.
After the meeting I drove back to my room in Stuart and for the following days I had time on my own to take care of my bible studies and pray. I did some long walks down at the water and I just thanked GOD for everything created. So beautiful and I really enjoyed every minute of my stay. I even chose to eat healty and tried different kinds of fish with salad. In downtown Stuart I tried mahi-mahi for the first time ever and man was it good.
I also had a mission during the rest of my stay that I still dont really understand. I did two visits at two different homes with two different persons facing death. Both suffering cancer and both in hospitz. It was so sad to see both their lifes coming to an end but I am glad I had a chance to pray for them as I believe that GOD can do the impossible. To me the most important things were that they both got born again and it were with tears in my eyes I said to them both that we will meet again. Please agree in our prayers for these brothers that they could experience GODS amazing healing power. These both men have really made me think about life and made me even more thankful. The biggest miracle of them all is salvation and the very second we accept Jesus Christ as our Lord and Saviour we are new creations in Christ Jesus and we will get eternal life in heaven together with our heavenly Father. That is such a gift and it is all about GODS love and amazing grace.
Thanksgiving in USA
I had the honor to be invited to brother Garrys father home for thanksgiving. His family were all gathered and it was such a pleasure to celebrate thanksgiving together with them. This was my first thanksgiving ever and I really enjoyed it.
The last day over in Florida to brothers, Jerry and Joel helped me with getting the both bikes to the shipping company in Pompano Beach. Nice brothers and nice rides. Now everything were taken care of and I could start packing my bags for the long flight(s) back home to my family and home in Finland. Of course we had breakfast at Cracker Barrel after we delivered the bikes and I really needed that so I could spend all my energy on finding the right color Converse shoes for my youngest daughter. I cant believe I drove 100 miles just to get her the right shoes. A dad´s gotta do what a dad´s gotta do :)
On my way home
I returned the rental car and took the shuttle to the airport sunday morning. I flew from West Palm Beach to Toronto, Canada in the afternoon and I did not know that I needed to have a permit to access Canada, even if I were just in transfer. I had to go through all that stuff they do at the immigration office and answer their questions about what brought me to Canada. I had to tell them; dont worry I am leaving as soon as you let me go to my flight. No matter they needed to go through the procedure and hassle me around. I am glad I made my flight just in time as Canada did not seem to be the place I would have liked to be stuck at.
The flight over the Atlantic ocean was smooth, I slept most of the time. In Frankfurt I had to walk from one side of the airport to the other side and again GOD were with me as the flight were delayed so I managed to get to the gate in time. From Frankfurt I flew to Stockholm, Sweden where I waited for four hours to get on the last flight home to Vasa, Finland where my dad picked me up and took me home to my family and my home sweet home. So nice to be home, all my children and my wife were there to help me open my bags. There is no place like home and being away from home makes me homesick. When I get homesick I really see the gifts I have at home, my wife and my children. Thank you Jesus for them!
Exciting times
Well, know when I am home I am continuing doing what I am called to do here at home, be a good husband and a father. I am excited to continue studying the word of God and december will be my fourth month at the bible school. I actually feel that I am learning more and more in my spirit and it is amazing how I can use what I learn just in regular life. We can not understand how GOD is working but HE sure is doing something now.
Next week december 7th I will meet my biological mother for the first time ever since she gave me away back in 1972. Our meeting is hooked up by finnish television who are making a documentary about it and I will also meet my grandma. Very interesting and very exciting but I have to confess that I am a bit nervous so please remember this meeting in your prayers. I had some contact with my mother over the phone just after I got saved in 1997 but I was not ready for this so I just dropped the connection and I have felt bad about it ever since. Now GOD opened the door thru TV2 and I am thankful that everything goes together with GODS timing.
I also will have one meeting in december, in Paimio outside Turku december 10th. Other than that december will be a month at home with lost of time together with my family and with the word of GOD.
January 1st it is time to celebrate my four years in my lovely church, Kvevlax Missionskyrka and I would like to invite all of you to come there. The choir will be singing and I will be singing and speaking and there will be some special guests this year again. The last three years these evenings have been really good and people who normally doesn´t go to church are coming. The evening starts at 7PM and after the meeting we are all eating something good together.
Until next time I would like to wish you all GODS amazing blessings and love!
Pontus
