Story from WV Promise Keepers:  Phil Ruggerio from CMS, Inc. attended both days.  CMS is Correctional Medical Services, Inc. out of St. Louis, MO and they are one of the largest, if not the largest private provider of medical services to prisons and jails in the USA.  Phil is CMS’s Regional Administrator for West Virginia.

I ran into Phil three times during the conference.  During the Saturday lunch break I ran into him out on the front sidewalk as Bill Haines and I were talking.  Phil related to us that he was supposed to serve as an EV volunteer for the altar call Friday night.  As Joe White was leading up to the altar call Phil’s cell phone went off.  He went out to answer it.  The call was from the Assistant Director of Nursing at Mt. Olive; she informed Phil she had an employee in a major crisis.  She is new to her position and her boss, the Director of Nursing, couldn’t be reached.  Phil told her he would be there as soon as he could and headed for the Civic Center parking garage.  Phil shared with us that he was disappointed and angry because he was really looking forward to being part of the altar call.  He was almost to his car and was reaching for his keys when he saw a man bent over the hood of the car next to his.  He went over and asked the man if there was a problem and found him sobbing in tears.  He told Phil he just came out of the Promise Keepers arena – he couldn’t do it – he couldn’t face up to who he was and be humble enough to ask Jesus to be his Lord and Savior.  Phil asked him if he could pray with him and the guy said yes.  During their prayer together the man accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior.  It gets better………………….

As Phil and his new best friend were talking here came another guy into the garage in tears.  Phil ended up praying with him.  It gets better…………………..

Phil told me that they kept coming.  He lost count, but estimates that he ended up praying and talking with about fifteen guys in the parking garage.  He finally got on the road at about 10 PM.

We grow up getting bombarded with exhortations to "get some common sense".  Parents, teachers, everyone tells us that common sense is necessary to succeed in the world.  We shake our heads at those who seem to lack it.  Common sense would have pushed Phil into his car and out onto the road………and he would have missed the altar that God called him to on the hood of a car.

Brother Chambers wrote that "We have no right to decide were we should be placed, or to have preconceived ideas as to what God is preparing us to do. God engineers everything; and wherever He places us, our one supreme goal should be to pour out our lives in wholehearted devotion to Him in that particular work."  "Whatever your hand finds to do, do it with your might………." Ecclesiastes 9:10

Peace be with you,

Mike Coleman