The Price of Wrong Thinking
By Drenda Keesee
Several months ago, I went to Colorado for a skiing trip with a friend. She was a very experienced skier, and I was, well…not. I did a last minute crash course lesson the day before (crash course is right!), but the skiing hills in Ohio are “slightly” smaller than the skiing mountains in Colorado.
When my flight arrived in Colorado, I was actually busy having a pity-party over something that had happened that week.
I let myself slip into wrong thinking.
My friend and I took our bags to our rental car. As we were putting our bags in the car in the dark, I moved the seat and accidentally…
…smashed my friend’s finger. She was bleeding, so I sent her back into the airport to get a Band-Aid, and I continued to load our luggage.
Then I slipped and fell on some ice.
Hard.
Really hard.
So hard I literally saw stars.
My head and my elbow had slammed against the concrete, and I felt searing pain. I can only imagine what anyone around may have been thinking when they heard me praying in the spirit and binding the devil as I laid there on the ground.
When my friend returned, I didn’t tell my friend how badly I had fallen. I was determined to push through.
When I woke up the next morning, my elbow was black and blue. It hurt, but I still went skiing that day.
But I kept falling. And, wow, was my elbow hurting.
I learned so much that week from some incredible mentors and leaders of the faith. It was an amazing trip.
But I was hurt. In fact, I went an entire week in pain and not realizing I had broken my elbow and separated my tricep. Yes, I said an entire week.
I ended up having surgery to reattach the tendon and a supernaturally quick recovery. I was supposed to have a sling on for six months, but after three weeks the doctor said my arm was healing so quickly that I didn’t need to wear it.
That was great news, but the bottom line was that I had missed God.
We’ve all missed God before.
It doesn’t take much—just a few seconds to open the door to the enemy. Just a few seconds of anger or offense or unforgiveness and the door is open.
And none of us can afford to be in his camp for even a few seconds.
You can’t let your mind go there.
Listen in Now to Faith Life Church!
Drenda Keesee’s contagious zeal and humorous personal experiences help make her ministry of spiritual, emotional and relational wholeness one that will bless your life and spark a new fire in your spirit.
A wife of over 30 years and a mother of five children, Drenda has ministered at churches, seminars, and conferences, and through the mediums of television and radio, for more than 20 years.
Her books, The New Vintage Family, Better Than You Think, and She Gets It are available wherever books are sold. In these heartfelt books, Drenda shares her personal journey and the life lessons that have brought her to where she is today, as well as practical answers that all people need to live a joyful life.
Drenda and her husband Gary founded Faith Life Now, a ministry designed to spread the message of freedom in the areas of finances, faith, marriage and family. Faith Life Now hosts conferences worldwide, and sponsors both Fixing the Money Thing, which Drenda co-hosts with her husband Gary, and Drenda.
Through their own life experiences, the Keesees have found the principles from God’s Word to be powerful and effective. At one point, Drenda was a young, suicidal feminist with no hope of ever being “good enough” for her own standards of perfection. She never wanted the “inconvenience” of a husband or children, and she was on her own path to success. But the stress of trying to achieve perfection and perform for love left her broken and used. She had success, but it was nothing compared to the pain and loneliness it had also brought.
That’s when God got a hold of her heart. It was there—at her lowest point—that she found the One who accepted and loved her, faults and all. Since that transformation, Drenda has had a passion to reach women who find themselves where she once was.
She married Gary after attending college, and there she found herself in a personal boot camp of sorts. She says, “I cried and told God, ‘I can do anything but be a wife and mother.’” She committed to learning how to do it God’s way. Through the many years of raising their children and struggling to make ends meet, Drenda learned from their mistakes. “I didn’t know how to be a wife and mother, but God saved our marriage, taught us how to parent our children for success, showed us how to have financial success, and then irony of all ironies, He called us to ministry.” It’s truly because of these life experiences that Drenda can now share so many insightful principles for people who are now going through the same struggles.
Gary and Drenda pastor Faith Life Church at The Now Center in New Albany, Ohio and also are the CEOs of Forward Financial Group.
