Today I was with Michael Gravitt, one of my favorite grownups. He is an incredible man of God, a missionary to Romania, and he’s also been given the gift of prophecy. Anyway, we started by heading downtown to eat breakfast at Gardners Market, but we ended up getting kind of lost and walking around some.
Learning About Leadership
During that time, Michael taught me a little bit about people. I was joking about people thinking I was from the army because I was dressed in camo sweater, pants, and boots, and Michael told me that most people aren’t thinking about what you look like, they’re thinking about how they look compared to you, or how your outfit reminds them of one of their outfits, etc. Finally, we met a lady who gave us directions to Gardners Market, and we had breakfast. While we ate, Michael told me some of his life story, and said that “God will give you general direction quickly; specific direction comes in time.”
Also, Michael told me how life is like BZFlag (a multi-player computer game we play). There are laser spammers and genocide nuts trying to raise their score, but the only objective is to capture the flag. And if your score is at -20, but you have captured their flag 5 times, then who cares about your score! In life, there are ‘spammers’, trying to get ahead and make money, but the only goal in life is to tell people the good news of Jesus and do his work; that is how we ‘capture the flag’.
After we had finished, Michael and I just hopped in his car and drove around talking. I asked him questions like “How did you get so close to God” and “Why did you move to Romania”. He had some really profound things to say, like ” You need to give the Lord time to answer; God may not want to talk about what you want to talk about right now – you may be asking ‘What am I doing when I grow up?’ and God might ask ‘Have you read your Bible today?‘ Just keep listening, and he will give you an answer” and “There is NO real pursuit of God without reading your Bible on a daily basis” and “Make sure it’s your choice to follow God; you’re not just doing it because it is your family’s thing.”
It was almost eleven by then, so we dropped by McDonald’s, and Michael grabbed some coffee. We talked some more about some of his wisest/not-wise decisions; his wisest was when he started to follow God with his whole heart and his not-so-wise was when he was feeling depressed, and joined the Navy (by the way; don’t join the Navy just because you’re depressed). He told me that just because God has forgiven you does not mean there aren’t consequences.
After leaving McDonald’s, he was almost finished with me, but he wanted to have a prayer time together. So, we climbed up on the top of our hill and started praying. Afterward, Michael taught me about leadership, and how you have to lose to be a leader. For example, if you let someone always be first, then you are ‘losing’, but you are letting Gods light shine through you. When we came down from the hill, to illustrate his point, Michael washed my feet. I had learned a lot today, and I left a lot wiser, especially when it came to life. And I know that his main point will always stick with me; to make sure that the voice I hear is really God, and not the devil or my head, and then obey through the power of the Holy Spirit.
