From the Cutting Room: Habakkuk 3:17-19

What is the secret to finding joy, salvation, and strength in all circumstances?

The short book of Habakkuk answers that question: In all circumstances, find joy, salvation, and strength in the LORD.

I had the privilege to preach the ending of this powerful book this Sunday. You can listen to it here if you’d like.

In this post, I provide my personal testimony of learning this powerful truth. I cut what follows out of the sermon because not everything fits into a sermon. Just like those old-school film makers would cut out scenes and just leave them on the cutting room floor, preachers must do similarly. What follows is an opportunity to read my “cutting room floor”.

I am learning this secret… 

I have been walking with the LORD for 22 ½ years.

I was saved in June of 2001, the week of my 20^th birthday. And the LORD has been teaching me this secret in the high places He has for me over these years:

In Sept of 2001- September 11, 2001 to be exact- the LORD called me to join the Marine Corps. In the days following that day, I started walking the path to join as soon as I finished college.

In April of 2003, I carried the casket of one of my best high school friends who had preceded me into the military. Ryan was an Army Ranger, and he was killed in Iraq when terrorists strapped a bomb to a woman and sent her towards a checkpoint my friend was working. I hugged at least 3 women the day of his funeral: Ryan’s mom, my mom, and my then girlfriend, Kelli Houser.

A month later I commissioned in the Marine Corps. Those days shaped my life and they shaped my relationship with the LORD. He showed me joy in the midst of that season, and gave me strength to move towards the life He had for me even though I saw the cold results of combat in a very real way.

In 2005 and 2007, I deployed- both times to Iraq where Ryan was killed. We lost more people. I attended more funerals. And the LORD continued to strengthen me as each year passed.

From 2005 through 2008, Kelli and I (now married) wrestled through the repeated, month-by-month grief of infertility. When would God provide us a child that we desperately longed for?

In 2008, the LORD led Kelli and I to adopt 3 toddlers all at once. Zero kids to three toddlers. In January, a doctor told us we would not have biological children. In November, we brought these children into our home. By the next January, the adoption was finalized. To date, the process I just described is the fastest adoption I’ve ever heard of.

These experiences- these high places- shaped our walk with the LORD.

Just as we were hitting our stride in the Marine Corps and growing as young parents, the LORD called me to get out of the Marine Corps (that I loved) to plant this church. He had me walk through the painful process of stripping away my identity as a Marine and ensuring my identity was found in Christ- Christ alone. (Man, that one is still an on-going battle.)

In 2012, while I was waiting to fulfill that call to plant a church, I tread into the high places of a deployment to Afghanistan. I left those three little kids and my wife. And the LORD was with me. And the LORD was with them.

In 2013, We planted the church.

In 2014, We adopted a teenager.

In 2017, We adopted another toddler.

From 2011 to present, we (several of us- notably my mentor through the entire church-planting journey, Clint Clifton) started this effort to plant a network of churches in military communities all over the world- The Praetorian Project. Planting a church is hard enough. Planting a church in a military community is even more difficult. Now we’re trying to plant lots of churches in military communities all over the world. 

This past January, I got a call from Pastor JD that Clint was missing. “It seems that his plane went down somewhere in the mountains of North Georgia. He left last night and hasn’t made it home.” We later found out that he did not survive that crash.

That started what has been a year full of high and difficult places for me.

And yet, God has been faithful through it all. He has provided joy at every turn, and He, the God of my salvation, has given me strength for every day.

Over the years, in all of these high places, more and more, little by little, God has been teaching me this secret. He has been giving me strength to tread on the high places he has given me.

I share all of this for a very specific reason:

I believe God is calling you to something challenging and difficult in this life. He has not saved you for comfort and ease. I want to encourage you to tread on the high places God has for you. Maybe it is something you are in it right now, or perhaps it is something you are being called into. I believe that you are to walk in it and towards it with joy, salvation, and strength. You are to tread on these high places with your trust in the LORD, singing with joy to the LORD, finding your salvation in the LORD, and finding your strength in the LORD.

“for God gave us a spirit not of fear but of power…” (2 Tim. 1:7 [ESV])

I love you guys,

Brian O’Day

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