Oh…. Great!!!

“Afterward he appeared to the eleven themselves as they were reclining at table, and he rebuked them for their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they had not believed those who saw him after he had risen. And he said to them, “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. And these signs will accompany those who believe: in my name they will cast out demons; they will speak in new tongues; they will pick up serpents with their hands; and if they drink any deadly poison, it will not hurt them; they will lay their hands on the sick, and they will recover.” So then the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven and sat down at the right hand of God. And they went out and preached everywhere, while the Lord worked with them and confirmed the message by accompanying signs.”

‭‭Mark‬ ‭16‬:‭14‬-‭20‬ ‭

Today is Easter Sunday, April 5th 2026 and churches were packed. I sat in service with my wife and kids. Occasionally I looked around and noticed they pulled out three more rows worth of chairs for today and there was still hardly any room to sit. It’s a great problem to have when a church runs out of seats. It’s even better when they run out of room for more chairs.

One thing that I have realized over the years is that people would step through the doors who normally wouldn’t do it but twice a year. I sat there in service thinking, man, it would be awesome if service was this full every Sunday and not just twice a year, then The Great Commission came to my mind. “Go into all the world and share the gospel.” The very first word is GO! The Lord doesn’t call us to be pew sitters, He calls us to be more.

What does MORE look like to you?

That’s one of the reasons I started doing these blogs for that very reason. Nobody wanted to give me the time nor the platform so I felt the Lord calling me to create my own.

A lot of times Christians don’t want to show themselves as the church beyond the four walls they call the church and I am guilty of the same thing.

Hebrews 10:23-25 says “Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”

‭ This verse addresses the importance of church attendance as we are to come together and encourage one another. It is not only our duty to encourage each other but also those who don’t know the Lord. We so now that Easter is done and over we should follow the Great Commission and GO.

ambassador rising

What does your witness look like?

Shortly after I dedicated my life to the Lord in 2001, I joined a traveling ministry where we traveled the country and did skits for churches. We even did street ministry and went door to door just witnessing to people. We (The teams I was on) relied heavily on love offerings and the occasional money our parents would send us. I never felt like I belonged in the youth group I attended. I often joke about being rejected by the nerds… But when I joined the ministry, I grew in boldness. I read a lot about how Paul (The guy who wrote a majority of the New Testament) was bold in his faith especially when he was persecuted for it. Paul went from hunting and killing Christians to being the one we inspire to become the most like.

My faith in the Lord and my witness became so strong that I would tell anybody and everybody anbout the Gospel regardless of what may come to me.

What does your witness look like?

Fast forward to a few years later. I was married, my first born was only a few months old and we had went out to Arizona to visit my parents and my brothers. I can’t remember the reason, but we flew in and out of Las Vegas which was 4 a four hour drive from their house. My dad and one of my brothers had picked us up from the airport. after about a week, we had three friends take us back to that same airport. These were friends I grew up with so naturally we were being extremely sarcastic with each other.

About an hour into the drive and several barbs thrown at each other, I heard the Lord whisper to me “tell your friend that I love him”. My response was “We still have three hours left to drive so I’ll tell him at some point.” for some reason I didn’t want to be the buzz kill of the trip. During the trip the barbs didn’t stop coming, and the Lord asked me three other times to tell my friend that He loved him.

We get to the airport and I hear the Lord say one more time “tell him I love him”. And for the fourth and final time of the trip I decided to keep my mouth shut. I went from being extremely bold in my faith and will to witness to anybody and everybody to not wanting to look like an idiot in front of my friends. A week and a half later I got a phone call from one of my other friends on that trip that the friend I refused to tell about the love of Jesus had ended his life. I was so shaken and felt so guilty about what had happened that I yelled and God and said “Don’t you ever ask me to do something like that again”. I didn’t want the resposibility of someone else’s eternity on my shoulders. Romans 10:14 says ‘How then will they call on Him whom they do not believe? How will they believe in whom they have not heard? How will they hear without someone preaching?’ verse 15 says: ‘How are they to preach unless they are sent?’ I had believe whole-heartedly that I was who Paul was talking about in verse 15 and my friend was potentially the man he was talking about in verse 14. Had my friend ever heard about the love of Jesus? I don’t know.

What does your witness look like?

Fast forward to about five years ago, my witness wasn’t as weak as it had been but I still allowed the guilt of what had happened cause me to second guess what I was going to say. I would stumble during my speech. I was at a birthday party and a friend had asked me why I was so afraid to tell people about the love of Jesus when He had blessed my family and I so much. I told her what had happened to my friend and she rebuked the spirits of guilt and fear out of me and started praying for love and grace to return.

I still don’t like getting up in front of large crowds and I still sometimes stumble and second guess what I am wanting to say. But even as I am writing this (this is not in my notes) God called Moses who stumbled and stuttered a lot in his speech. Did that make Moses any less called? No. 2nd Corinthians 5:20 says ‘We are ambassadors for Christ, God making His appeal through us.’ Since my friend had spoken over me what she had, I have studied more and asked for the boldness to return to me so I be that kind of witness again. Have I succeeded in being that witness every single time? No, but I still put in that effort to make sure that those who God brings into my path will know That Jesus loves them.

February of ‘24 I got the chance to meet my favorite author at a meet and greet in St. Louis. I was extremely nervous about what I was going to say to him while he was signing the book I just bought from him. I had been thinking about what I wanted to say for several weeks, and when the time came to say what I wanted to say to him, Jesus whispered into my ear: “Tell him I love him.” I said “I drove three and a half hours to meet you and have you sign this book for me. I thought about what I wanted to say to you, but the only thing that comes to mind is the only thing that matters in this moment. Jesus Loves you man, I hope you know that and just how much he does.” He looked at me with a surprised look on his face. His eyes said “nobody ever wants to tell me that”. I hope I read that look wrong. Did he get saved that night? No, at least, not while I was there. Is he saved now? I don’t know. My job was to plant the seed. I walked away that night proud that I was able to have to opportunity to witness to that man.

I will end with this 2nd Timothy 1:7 says “God has not given us a spirit of fear, but one of power and love and a sound mind”

What does your witness look like?

‘25 Fangs

Where is God in your life?

Over the last week, I have come up with several ideas on what I would like for this week’s topic to be. What should I write about in this entry? Will anybody read it? Will anybody care? These are a few of the minor thoughts I have throughout the week. So after writing a lot and deleting a lot, here is what I have settled on:

Those who know me well know that 2025 was a real struggle. Just one bad thing after another kept happening to my family and I. I spent the entire summer of ‘25 looking for a new job. At first, it was exciting, but after a while, it just wore me down. At first, my job hunt was just church or ministry-related work. I had several interviews where I knew I had landed the job. But without even an explanation, those places would just decide to not even return my calls or emails. Days turned into weeks and weeks turned into months with no offers or even follow-ups. I started questioning where God was in all of this. He would remind me that He was in all of this and that I just needed to trust Him.

Every business said they were hiring, but nobody would hire me. I couldn’t even get a job at a gas station. The job that did end up hiring me only pays barely above minimum wage, but touts that they are the greatest company to work for (what company doesn’t). I managed to get a second job that paid more but will only worked it’s employees part-time hours. To cap off the end of the year, I was on my way home from a really long work day. I was doing some shopping before I got home when I received a call saying that my dad had pancreatic cancer. I was in the middle of the checkout lane when the call came. It took every fiber of my being not to freak out and just lose absolute control in the middle of the store. When I hung up the phone, I asked God to give me the strength to at least get out to my car so I could let loose on Him where nobody could see.

I got out to the car, turned it on, and before I let loose, He asked me how much I trusted Him. I said with everything I had, I trusted Him. I had made decisions in life trusting in God and His plans. He then told me that everything would be okay and that I needed to trust Him. Even in our darkest days, my household has always and will always trust in God because He has always supplied all of our NEEDS according to His riches and glory. Not wants, but NEEDS.

I spent the last several months praying hard for my dad and not really worrying about the other stuff. My Facebook friends have seen that I have shared a few posts regarding his journey. A few weeks ago, we were told that the tumor had shrunk to the point where the doctors can and will do surgery to remove it.

We always ask the Lord to guide our steps, and He does promise that He will never leave us or forsake us. But the hard truth to recognize is that sometimes that very path that we ask Him to guide us is an extremely hard path full of thorns and scary moments, but where does this path lead? It leads us to the promises God has for us. Am I working in an area that I want to work? No. Do I feel fulfilled in what I do? Also no but I realize that I am where God wants me right now.

In the middle of the tumultuous 2025, I had a dream that I was standing near the doors of a farming store when the sky got really dark, the wind started blowing really hard. Trash was flying across the parking lot cars were being lifted off the ground. The doors and windows of the store were ripped from the frames. Everyone inside ran to the center of the store while I looked up to the sky. I watched as a funnel started to descend from the sky. I grabbed the door frame that was anchored down and didn’t budge. The funnel was about to touch the ground when I said, “You promised…” That was all I said. The funnel cloud didn’t touch down but instead went back into the sky, which cleared up immediately afterward.

Where is God in your life? What does the path that you are currently walking on look like? Is He guiding you, or are you refusing to move because the path that lies before you scares you or you don’t think it’s the right path?

Trust God even when you don’t understand what He’s doing.

-Chad Pippin

03/22/2026

The Orphan’s mirror

Who does God say you are?

This is a question I have asked myself and others for a few years now. Take everything you have and everyone you hang out with, strip all away then tell me who you are.

For the longest time, I would look in the mirror and not like the man looking back at me. I see all the inconsistencies, imperfections, blemishes, sins, whatever you want to call them, and I would let the struggles I was going through at the time, and let those determine who I was. I had no problem when lifting others out of this mindset, but I wouldn’t tell anybody when I was going through the same struggles.

Growing up, I had a hard time fitting in with any crowd, and being perfectly honest, I still do. If I’m talking to a large group of people, I start to second-guess everything I am saying because all eyes are on me. It really stems from when I was a kid, someone I looked up to was ignoring me, and when I finally struck up the nerve to ask why, they said: “You’re not good enough.” That really stuck with me, even all these years later. Don’t ask me for a name because I won’t tell you. I have forgiven this person and what was said to me.

The Bible says in the opening pages ‘God created human beings in His own image. In His own image He created male and female.’ Let’s go a few steps forward and read Romans 8:38. ‘I am convinced that NOTHING can EVER separate us from God’s love. Neither Death, nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow- not even the powers of Hell can separate us from God’s Love’. Let’s let those two verses sink in. First of all, God created US in HIS own image. In the beginning, YOU were on God’s mind. Before we were created, God knew us, and there is nothing we can do that will stop Him from loving us.

Now you may be asking what does all of this information have to do with the title? Well, when that person said what he did all those years to me, it made me feel like I didn’t belong anywhere. It planted the seeds of that orphan heart in me. I would look in the mirror and tell myself I DON’T deserve anything I had, I would NEVER achieve my dreams, and I would NEVER achieve anything in life. These were words that I allowed to define who I was for many years. The orphan spirit is not a spirit of God. You belong to Him.

I’ll ask the question again. Who does God say you are? My Bible says We are His and despite all our flaws and blemishes that we may be ashamed of, HE still says, “I want that one.”

-Chad Pippin

3/15/2026