II Chronicles 16:9 says,

"the eyes of the Lord run to and fro throughout the whole earth to show Himself strong on behalf of those who have a perfect heart towards Him."

Do I do what is right in the eyes of the Lord? Remember it is His eyes and His decision as to what is right, and He is the one who answers prayers or not. This is why we need to know the Lord, who knows our heart, and whether it is up to date with the Holy Spirit, who talks to us about sin, righteousness, and a coming day of judgment.

Mr. Campbell wanted us to know it wasn't just us doing our thing and God will bless.

When God answered prayer concerning the watch in the hay field, and the bear in the last lesson, I wanted to see God answering prayer in other areas of my life. It gave me a sense of AWE towards God and a desire to keep a clean heart. When my heart was not clean I knew 1 John 1:9, and what to do about my sin.

Now I want to tell you about something that felt good and yet was not right. It is about girls. For you girls, it could be about guys.

I told you about finding the mirror as a teenager and the other thing I found was girls. As a child I was too busy working and playing with boys to pay much attention to girls.

As a teenager going to high school in town I started to notice that some girls were nice and some were good at talking nice. Of course Mr. & Mrs. Campbell had told us that if we were a Christian then you should not go with girls who are not. Some of those who are not Christians can look nice and talk nice too. But knowing II Chronicles 16:9 made me know it was wrong and I shouldn't encourage anything.

Is God's favor more important than the favor of others? Wow! God was testing me again. Being tempted was one thing but yielding is another. We knew an old song that said "Yield not to temptation for yielding is sin." Thank you Lord for keeping me from yielding to things I shouldn't do.

AH! But there is another thing and that is: "What about a girl who is a Christian?" God doesn't say you can't go with a girl that is a Christian, so will any Christian do as long as you like her and she likes you?

I met a girl who was a Christian, lived in town and went to a different church than I did. She liked me and I liked her. At first we met when our two youth groups got together, then we would talk before and after the meeting. Then the question came up as to whether I would go skating with her in the big hockey arena Saturday afternoon. There were lots of others skating and the nice music was a plus.

Sometimes we went to watch hockey games together. Naturally, we held hands. This lasted for a couple of months, mostly on Saturdays. We did not commit immorality.

As time went on I came to realize that she wasn't as serious about God and seeing God work on her behalf as I was. But do you know that she quit me and not the other way around? If you are a teenager you may well know what this feels like.

God wanted me to know that I needed to ask Him about who should be my wife and not make decisions on my own. He had something far better in mind for me.

As a result of this experience I began to pray for the girl that God had for me. I'll tell you about that later.

At this down time God gave me another answer to prayer. It was spring time and I was working sod down in a field that was over two miles from anyone else. Have you ever been two miles away from every other human being?

I had a tractor and a tandem disc going over rough ground in a large field. Dad had given me a large wrench which wouldn't go all the way into the tool box on the tractor. I needed to carry it so that I could tighten the nuts and bolts on the disc when needed.

My Dad had a way of putting things when they were important to him. "Don't come home tonight without that wrench," were his parting words. I knew he would let me come home without it, but I also knew he would be disappointed if I lost it.

I was going up and down the field, checking every once in a while if the wrench was still there. Yes! Yes! Yes! Yes! — Oh no! Now the wrench was gone. Where could it be? Fallen in a furrow and covered over with dirt by the disc?

An hour or so later I got the disc stuck, but managed to get the tractor out before it got stuck. I needed a chain which was about a quarter of a mile across the field by my grease pail.

Just before I left to run across the field to the grease pail, God said "Why don't you ask me to find that wrench?" Good idea! I had learned in the cabin that God knew everything and I knew that He knew where the wrench was. I thought if God knows where the wrench is I will not need to crawl on my hands and knees looking for it.

I was about halfway to the chain when my foot caught in a willow root and I fell flat out on the ground. It was a sudden stop. I was going to get up but turned around to see what I had tripped on. Right there not even two feet away was the wrench lying on the ground. WOW! I felt that God was there and even though I had been feeling low over the girl friend thing God showed me that He still loved me and was interested in me. I came to know, if I would rest in Him, He would take care of the future.

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