I’ll be honest: this is a little
hard to post. We always point these amazing young people back to
Jesus, but if I am totally honest, it is my goal in life to
demonstrate the power of God, family, and holiness, not just talk about
it. Lisa and I are honored and touched to be loved by such an awesome
woman of God.
From Kari Pitardi
:
I met
Gary Black back at World Race training camp in
September 2006. I was absolutely blown away by this man. He was
boisterous, enthusiastic, PASSIONATE and overflowing with joy and
excitement. Joy oozes out of him, I would stand next to him just to
suck the joy out of him by osmosis because he definitely has it in
abundance.
I immediately took a liking to him, his strong character,
deep passion and obvious very intimate relationship with the Lord.
While I was basically enamored with him, I was also petrified of him.
He speaks truth, and he speaks it blatantly.
He’s not afraid of what
people think of him. Training was amazing trying to stand near him yet
avoid him all at the same time.
I got to see Gary a second time in training we had in Mexico,
January of this year. It was the same type of experience, trying to
just get near him. Hmmm… maybe similar to the bleeding woman just
trying to get near Jesus to touch the hem of his robe to be healed.
Maybe I need to take Gary down a notch in my book and put God back up
there where he belongs. (Just kidding; God is still God in my book, and
there is no one above Him.)
So I’d try to be near Gary so I could hear
what he was talking about, even if it was to someone else! To steal
some of the radiating energy flowing from him, or maybe, just maybe, he
had a word for me that day…
He teased a lot; he said the Lord had told
him many things about me, but it was not the right time to reveal them
to me and he made me wait to hear a word from the Lord. That wasn’t
fair.
We eventually sat down one day and he spoke the words the Lord
had given him, which was the truth of my life, that I had never told
him, yet he knew somehow. It was like watching a psychic on TV, except
it was him speaking my life over me. I didn’t understand. But he was
right on, and it was good to hear, though painful.
I met Gary a 3rd
time here in Swaziland the first of June. At our debrief when we first
arrived, him and his wife were here. We girls on the race were required
to sign up for counseling sessions with some of the women available to
speak to us.
I chose his wife
Lisa Black,
not because I knew her or even had any idea who she was as I’d never
seen her before, but figured she must have been pretty cool if she was
Gary’s wife. I signed up for 2 sessions with her and decided to be
painfully honest and pour out my heart to her since I hadn’t been
feeling emotionally well for quite a while.
Lisa
is as amazing a woman of God, as Gary is an amazing man of God. I’ve
tried to stand near her to suck the oozing goodness out of her, as well,
and talked to her as much as I could early on.
Their kids are just as, if not even more amazing than they are! They
have six of them from four to 16 years old, and every single one of them has a
deep, personal, intimate relationship with the Lord. I’ve never seen
anything like it. I have many friends at home who love the Lord, and
their kids can tell you all the cool kids’ Bible stories of the book,
but these kids, the Black kids, they KNOW JESUS, not just the cute
stories of the bible. They know Jesus probably far better than I know
Jesus and I’m 29! (ugh).
More tomorrow!
