Pray for us, Please

First, thanks guys and gals for all of your prayers. They are appreciated.

As to us needing our faith to get us through this time, we have been through hard times before, and are well prepared for this. We have been tested - in the fire.

Here is an e-mail I sent out this morning:

This is kind of a strange position for me, since I'm usually the one doing the praying for others. But, in this case my family and I need the prayers of others.

I'm also fairly close-mouthed about our problems, but we need prayers and moral support.

In case you don't know the whole story:

Last year we rented a townhouse, that ended up being infected with mold, which was verified by both the county Health Nurse and the City Building Inspector. But the landlord refused to fix the problem. Because my daughter Tawnya has chronic asthma I knew we had to leave the townhouse. But, I could not afford to pay rent at both the townhouse and another house or motel, so I was forced to break the lease by not paying rent.

The landlord subsequently had us (justifiably) evicted, which we fully expected would happen. What we did not expect was that the landlord would confiscate everything we owned, which was still all in the house, and refuse to let us go back into the townhouse to remove our belongings from the house. After about 9 moths, when we finally found an attorney to take the case, the landlord told both the sheriff and a friend of ours that much or our belongings had been stolen. When we got the pictures from his "inventory", which were taken after the date when he said these things were stolen, they were in the pictures. Obviously the man lied.

We have since found out this is not new for him. If you type the name Floyd Unruh in Google, you will see that he lost his realtor's license, because he sold a house he said he owned, that he did not own; he lied!

Because he has all of our tax records, including packing slips and invoices for all of the $70,000+ worth of retail hunting product we had for sale, and because no one who helped us move actually "opened" boxes that product was packed in, to see what was in them, other than family members, our lawyers believe our case is extremely weak, and we cannot recover the estimated "market" (meaning garage sale) worth of our personal belongings, furniture, cookware, sterling silver, Diane's wedding dress, my fathers memorial flag, my personal hunting and religious library, my daughters stuffed animal collection and photo albums, our family photo albums, my 10 years of wildlife research, all five our computers, with the had copies for all of my hooks and articles (you get the picture, all of our personal items, many of which you cannot put a price on; nor can we recover the market (meaning even the wholesale value of our for-sale hunting products).

The lawyers want us to settle for $10,000, for what I estimate will cost us $107,000 to replace. Plus this man put me out of business.

We go to an "evidentiary hearing" to determine the validity of our claims of what was all "stolen" from us, and determine what the judicial system feels is the "at arms length sale" (meaning garage sale, not even "used" replacement) value of all of our property on November 29. Please pray that the judge will see things our way and rule justly in our favor.

As we have gone through this painful emotional and psychological process, living in hotels for the last year, living from hand to mouth, I have felt like Job in the Old Testament. Everything of material worth and sentimental value has been taken from us; and my on-line and mail order hunting product business has been ruined.

Although I have to ask myself why (in light of the fact that I try to do so much for God, through my writings, through my testimonies at churches and hunting organizations, and through my actions) this has happened to us.

Am I angry? Yes. Am I sad? Yes. But, not with God - with the landlord.

Do I doubt God's love for me? No.

I can only trust God that this is happening for some as yet unknown reason, and that there is a purpose for all of this turmoil in our lives.

The Bible states that we should praise God for everything in our lives.

Praise God for the trials we are going through, they will make us stronger, and I do realize that life as a Christian is not about "what" we get here on earth, it is not about "rewards" here on earth. Life as a Christian is about "how" we live here on earth. If we live life as a Christian, with love for others, including those who are against us, we receive a reward after life here on earth; immortal life in Heaven with Yahweh-God. Amen (so be it), Alleluia.

Lord I forgive Floyd for what he has done to us, and I ask you to reach out to him, so that he comes to know and love you. I ask this in the name of Jesus your son, my God, my Lord and my Savior. Amen.

Please pray for Diane, Tawnya and I - that we understand what is happening to us in God's plan, and that we have the strength to act like Christians in these difficult times. And ask that God's will be done in the outcome of our court case with Floyd Unruh.

May Yawheh bless all of you,

T.R. Michels