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    Captured: From Misery to the Ministry
    Captured: From Misery to the Ministry
    Captured: From Misery to the Ministry
    Ebook228 pages3 hours

    Captured: From Misery to the Ministry

    By Dr. Martin G Tharp PhD

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    About this ebook

    This is the compelling story of a young man who came from a life of poverty and relative obscurity to minister to literally thousands of people around the world. It is a true testament to the power of God that can take any life, change it, and use it for His glory!

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDr. Martin G Tharp PhD
    Release dateFeb 26, 2013
    ISBN9781301394685
    Captured: From Misery to the Ministry
    Author

    Dr. Martin G Tharp PhD

    Dr. Martin Tharp has been an avid student of the Bible for many years and holds a Bachelor, Master and eight Doctorates, one honorary and seven earned, including a Doctor. of Literature and two PhDs. He has been in full time ministry for over fifty-seven years and has authored forty-nine books to date, many of which are being used as curriculum in Bible colleges around the United States and abroad. He has also penned a number of gospel songs and recorded thirty-three albums as well as being actively involved in a school ministry to Northern Ireland in the United Kingdom for the past thirty-eight years, and Dr. Tharp has been honored twice by members of parliament in Ireland for their work in the Protestant and Catholic schools. He and his wife, Sharon, along with Maranda Howells, travel extensively across the USA and the whole of the British Isles holding evangelistic crusades in the churches of both countries.

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      Book preview

      Captured - Dr. Martin G Tharp PhD

      Captured

      From Misery

      To The Ministry

      By Martin G. Tharp, Ph.D.

      Copyright 2013 Martin Tharp Ph.D.

      Smashwords edition

      Smashwords Edition, License Notes; This ebook is licensed for your own personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.. Scripture quotations identified KJV are from the Hebrew-Greek Key Word Study Bible, King James Version. Copyright 1984, 1991 by AMG International, INC and the Living Bible Copyright 1971,1986 by Tyndale House Publishers INC

      Acknowledgment

      I am not certain that any of the people which I have mentioned in this autobiography who were major contributors are still alive, but whether they are or not, I want to acknowledge their impact on my life.

      I am eternally grateful to men like Ed Kelso, Joe Patterson, Ward Mayer and Paul Howard, who made an impact on me prior to my experience of salvation. After my conversion, which is only mentioned occasionally in this particular book, my long association with the man who became my pastor and mentor, Reverend Glen Wilson, I know God has blessed you all!

      Dedication

      I would like to dedicate this book to my mother who has long gone on to her reward but whose prayers were the catalyst which finally brought me to a salvation experience. To all those who like Paul Howard, Joe Patterson and Glen Wilson, are willing to lay down their very lives in order to present the Gospel to people who may be exactly like I appeared to be, unreachable, unchangeable, angry, confrontational and dangerous to myself as well as others, may God bless and reward you.

      We are now in the forty ninth year of Ministry, thirty two of which my mother lived to see. But without the prayers of my mother and men like I have mentioned, our work for the kingdom of God would more than likely have never transpired, nor would I be a Christian today. Multiplied thousands of young people who have come to know the Savior over the past forty years through our schools ministry alone, have been recipients of the extended ministry of those men and women.

      Table of Contents

      1. The Beginning

      2. Uncle Jack

      3. Death Threats

      4. My Penknife

      5. J.D. & Nina

      6. Ed Kelso

      7. Abandoned Again

      8. G. I. Joe

      9. Church?

      10. A Glass Of Beer

      11. California Bound

      12. A Man In My Mothers Bedroom!

      13. My Brother Jimmy, The Alcoholic

      14. On The Road

      15. A Jail Cell

      16. On The Run

      17. Jimmy; The Success

      18. Morro Bay & Rusty

      19. Mare Island Naval Shipyard

      20. Benicia

      21. China Lake

      22. My Brother Chuck

      23. A Bright Idea

      Epilogue

      About The Author

      Introduction

      A few years ago I wrote a book of poetry, called My Poetic Side, I discovered that there are some things which can be articulated far easier by using the medium of poetry. Since that discovery it has been my desire to put into normal written form some of the more painful aspects of my own life from a child to adulthood. My desire is that the testimony of some of those events might inspire others who are seemingly trapped in a life of despair to recognize that the circumstances they are faced with is not the problem, it is how they choose to face and deal with those circumstances that makes the difference!

      The divorce of my mom and dad when I was five years old was not an event which I relished, but neither was the alcoholism of my father which caused the divorce. Choosing to leave my mom, my older sister and my two younger brothers behind to live with my father, is a choice I have never regretted, but at the time it was the hardest decision a child of any age could possibly face, much less one only five years old.

      It has taken a lifetime of attempting to eradicate some of the memories of the more debilitating aspects of that portion of my life, and at the same time find comfort in the knowledge that God is now, and has always been in control.

      In the twenty nine books which I have written to date, I have included a modicum of memories in some of them, at least bits and pieces of some of those events, but I will probably never be able to deal with the pain of those years more succinctly than when I penned the book of poetry seven years ago.

      However, in recent years, I have been persuaded on several occasions to give my personal testimony to audiences with a very high percentage of teenagers and young adults. Much to my surprise, the response has been truly astounding and unexpected!

      One year before I began this manuscript, the Pastor of a large congregation in the British Isles related to me that more than a year after he had persuaded me to give my personal testimony, the younger generation in his church were still talking about the impact it had made on their lives.

      Had he been the only voice to articulate such results, this book would probably never have been written, simply because I have always been apprehensive and paranoid about making myself the central character of the story. We have lived our lives attempting to follow the Biblical principle of lifting up the Savior instead of allowing ourselves to be caught up in an ego trip, which unfortunately is a malady which seems to be a plague that is running rampant in the religious world.

      Many of the snippets of my life which I have included in this autobiography were long forgotten until I accepted the daunting task of opening the pages of past history, some of which much to my surprise still bring back painful memories.

      One of the reasons for including so many poems in this manuscript is simply because I discovered when I wrote the book titled My Poetic Side, it was a medium which allowed me to express myself and talk about subjects and events never possible before.

      Perhaps after reading this autobiography it will help you to understand why we have spent a fortune on the schools ministry which has consumed our lives and our finances for more than forty years attempting to convince the younger generation that there is still hope in Jesus when all else is falling in around them.

      Chapter One

      The Beginning

      An Adobe Shack, God, A Well and The Devil!

      For nearly forty nine years we have been involved in an Evangelistic ministry, forty of which includes giving free concerts to kids of all ages in school assemblies across America, and for the past twenty nine years in the British Isles. All of which has given me an opportunity to present brief snippets of personal testimony of the years of unbridled anger and the total lack of self-discipline following the divorce of my parents.

      Their divorce came because of my father’s alcoholism which drastically effected my childhood from five years old right through my teenage years and into my early twenties. It was ultimately the reason for the multiple scars which are still quite visible on my head and face. Of course the central theme to the message which I have delivered to hundreds of thousands of kids is the miracle of God’s changing power, transforming me from a hardened, godless, callous sinner who was far too handy with my fists, into a Minister of the Gospel.

      Many of the events of my life will ever remain between me and the Lord, but since there has recently been an unusual demand for me to put into book form portions of my personal experiences and pilgrimage, the conclusion of which was a salvation experience which I can and will relate in church youth groups and school assemblies, I decided to consider the prospect.

      Just over a year ago, one of the Churches where my family has ministered for nearly thirty years finally persuaded me to give my personal testimony rather than delivering a sermon on Sunday evening. Since they have an unusually large group of young adults and teenagers I consented to their request. I must admit that I was astounded at the overwhelming response from the crowd that evening. A year later, the Pastor informed me that although his young people had always enjoyed our ministry, no sermon from anyone who has spoken at their Church had made such an impact on them, and one which they were still talking about.

      He had been unsuccessful in persuading me to begin this project, simply because I have misgivings about writing about my own personal experiences. However, earlier this last year we attended a Bible conference at Willow Valley Resort in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, where Maranda Howells who travels with us had been scheduled to be the guest speaker for the final service. The subject of the second sermon of the main speaker; Tell your story, was like driving an arrow through my heart!

      It was as if someone had informed him of my hesitation to put my life story in print. I have always kept a fairly tight reign on sharing too much personal information, for it was my opinion that it was unnecessary and of little value to completely open the door to my past life for all to see!

      When the evening speaker announced the title to his message, several dear friends in the congregation who had urged me to put my life in print, all turned and looked at me with grins of satisfaction, believing that God had just provided the impetus to verify what many had attempted to persuade me to do. At the urging of several of the Pastors, plus my wife and Maranda, I finally agreed to at least hit the high points.

      Now, with all that said, where do I begin? How about at the beginning!

      Six years before I was born, the great depression hit America, leaving economic devastation in its pathway across the entire country. But that is a part of the history of the United States which has seemingly been forgotten, simply because there is hardly anyone left alive from that generation!

      Unfortunately, the financial ruin in 1929 was not the total extent of the havoc which ultimately destroyed thousands of homes as once proud men were reduced to the status of indigent panhandlers, who were forced to either stand for hours in bread lines, or go out on the streets begging for pennies in order to buy enough food to keep their families alive.

      I was preceded by three older brothers and a sister, all of whom had suffered the hardship of living in a nine by twelve tent in the woods of west Texas and New Mexico, without a toilet, running water, or electricity and with a gnawing hunger that accompanied them to bed nearly every single night.

      My two eldest brothers, Sandy and Joe were working on ranches as cowboys outside of Roswell New Mexico by the time I came along in April of 1935, just when the economic situation which plagued American families had eased slightly, but by that time my dad had developed a debilitating taste for alcohol. He said he needed a shot to ward off the chill every morning. I have been told that he handled it fairly well until after my two younger brothers were born, Gene (Verne Eugene) in 1937 and Chuck (Charles Lee) in 1939.

      I was four years old when we moved from Roswell to Texas, and dad landed a job as a short-order cook in a small café on the El Paso side of Isleta, Texas, and finally moved the family out of the tent and into an old dilapidated house he had rented out in the country about half way to El Paso. Chuck was born there, making him the first of the Tharp clan to be born in a house.

      It was there at that old house at four years old where I first learned there was a Devil! My sister Rusty was nine and my older brother Jimmy was eleven. They thought it was funny to hold me over an abandoned well and threaten to drop me into Hell, where they said the Devil lived if I didn’t do what they told me to!

      They convinced me of how hot hell was and they said I would burn forever and ever if they ever decided to drop me in! I was convinced that they would do it, so I quickly agreed to whatever they wanted me to do! There was an old run down barn on the property with a hay loft where they set up what Jimmy called their command center, for their imagined fort, then they informed me they needed me to help them stock it with ammunition to ward off their enemies! Their ammunition was in the form of golf ball size clods of dirt.

      After I spent an hour finding and supplying them with their ammunition, they ordered me to get behind a fifty gallon barrel which dad used for burning trash. I had no earthly idea what they had in mind, but when I hesitated, Rusty reminded me that the Devil was waiting for them to drop me into the well, and I would burn forever! Just the thought made me instantly obedient.

      At first it seemed like a good game, they were the soldiers protecting the settlers and I was the Indian trying to scalp them all! Every time I tried to move from the shelter of the barrel they quickly fired their ammunition at me, keeping me pinned down for over an hour. It really wasn’t that bad because they never managed to hit me with a clod, but when I finally became bored with this game, they certainly were not. They were having so much fun at my expense that my begging had no effect on them! After what seemed like an eternity, I saw my dad come walking through the bottom portion of the barn, I began to cry like they were killing me, screaming that I would tell dad if they didn’t let me go, and I was also gonna tell on them for trying to drop me down the well to the Devil! Jimmy yelled back that I could cry all I wanted to, because he was not afraid of dad, and the devil was gonna get me if I didn’t shut up!

      Rusty burst into to tears like she had already been beat to death and I do believe Jimmy wet his britches when dad stepped out where they could see him and said;

      So, you are not afraid of me huh? Sonny boy (Jimmy)! You and Rusty (Dorothy Blanche) get down here, RIGHT NOW!

      Looking back, I honestly think that was the moment when dad decided I was his favorite child. From then on, I was the only one who could reason with him when he came home drunk and rancourous. Unfortunately, dad started coming home in a drunken stupor far more frequently.

      Dad was a very mild mannered, considerate man until he had consumed a few drinks, then he became surly, rancorous and confrontational. His bouts of drunkenness increased rapidly until he hardly ever saw a sober moment. We went to bed every night during those months with the sound of heated arguments ringing in our ears. Nearly every night, bolstered by alcohol, he came home ready for a fight, and especially on paydays when mom would demand to know what had happened to all the money he had earned. I discovered that when they were just about to exchange blows, if I wrapped my arms around daddy’s leg, and begged him not to hit my mom, it nearly always ended the fight.

      Within a six month period, there was no money to pay the rent and we no longer had three meals a day, for they became less frequent and consisted mainly of beans, or biscuits and gravy. Since dad spent every penny he could get his hands on for drink in the bars, we were soon evicted from the house in Isleta and all seven of us landed back in our old tent just as the fall season came to west Texas. My uncle Jack (dads brother), felt sorry for us since he was certain we could not survive the coming winter months while living in a tent that barely kept us dry much less warm! He found and bought dad a five acre parcel of ground about three or four miles outside of Anthony, New Mexico, then helped dad set about building a two room adobe shack.

      The few weeks it required to build that pitiful shack would prove to be one of the highlights of my childhood simply because it was about the only clear remembrance I have of my dad when he was sober. Uncle Jack made sure that dad could not get his hands on any type of alcohol during the project, even though dad cried like a baby on more than one occasion as he begged Uncle Jack to bring him something to drink.

      Uncle Jack took dad in his old pickup and they brought several loads of straw from the hills a few miles away while Jimmy began the process of digging a huge square hole in the ground about two feet deep. Dad and uncle Jack found an old fifty gallon barrel to put on the back of the truck to carry water and since Gene and Chuck were too young to be of any help, dad backed the old truck into the edge of the shallow creek, then Jimmy, Rusty and I were all given small buckets to carry water for hours trying to fill the barrel enough times to then fill the hole they had dug.

      After allowing the water to soak into the ground for an hour, dad and Uncle Jack threw straw and dirt back into the hole that Jimmy, Dad, and Uncle Jack had dug. While it was still half full of water, Jimmy, Rusty and I were encouraged to jump up and down in it until it turned into a thick mud which dad and Uncle Jack then shoveled into pre-made rectangular forms 12X18 inches square and six inches deep, then left them in the sun to dry.

      The first couple of hours of playing in the mud was fun, but soon the straw began to cut into our flesh as we jumped up and down making mud for the adobe bricks. I will never forget the look on my dads face when he saw the blood oozing through the mud on our feet and legs. Even though all three of us had done the same thing, I guess because I was the youngest, dad picked me up in his arms and started to weep as he profusely apologized, begging for my forgiveness.

      Uncle Jack solved the problem by purchasing two waist high sets of water-proof waders, used for fishing, so he and dad took over the making of mud for the adobes, and for the next week we were only allowed to make the mud which was used for mortar since it contained no straw. We watched in awe as an adobe shack slowly

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