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Vinni Smith
April 9th, 2006, 12:10 AM
Hi all, Vinni Here. I just wanted to tell you a story. A story with a good ending. A story of our Heavenly Father and a story about my faith or lack of it sometimes.
My daughter Audrey, got very sick this fall. She ended up in the hospital after being sick for 3 months. She was diagnosed with Lupus or some sort of auto immune dissorder like that. The bills stacked to the ceiling as you can imagine. Now, I make decent $$$ but not a great abundance and I have 80/20 insurance. However, insurance does not pay a lot of things that require "specialists". Anyway, as I drove home from the hospital one day, I prayed to God a simple prayer. "God, I have no idea how I'm going to pay all these bills. I need your help". That was it. I really don't consider myself a prayer warrior. Well folks, I am hear to say God answers prayers! Now let's switch to the other theme of the story. I am a guitar pick maker. I designed and make The V-Pick. It was in it's embryotic state and I was just sending samples to a lot of people all over the world that I knew from guitar forums as a form of market research. Well, one of these chaps said "You need to put these picks on the market and we can all buy them!" I said "OK. How much should I charge?" A couple of them and my wife came up with the price and the boys then advised me where I should post about my new product. That was the end of January. The pick business immediately went crazy and I am still making picks both night and day. This week I broke the $4K mark and I just started selling them at the end of January!!! We are not behind in our bills at all. I wish I could say that it is all fun money but it is going to pay bills and that is OK with me because that is what it was supposed to do. God heard my cry and answered! I am asolutely sold out to that opinion.
Please don't think I am trying to peddle my picks by telling you this story. I have wanted to write this story on the internet somewhere and this forum just hit me as the proper place to do it. As a matter of fact, I did write it one day and deleted it after about an hour not knowing if I should tell everyone in fear they may think i was just being a salesman. Please understand that is not the case.
I met a wonderful couple that live down the street from me and come to find out his name is Gabe Monzo. He is in the band Malo with Jorge Santana. He knows Carlos Santana personally! Gabe and his wife Dawn are long time believers and now go to church with us. They came down a couple of weeks ago and we all laid hands on Audrey and prayed. The Holy Spirit filled the room. We all felt a feeling of warmth come over us like the room got very hot and we all had tears on our cheeks after the prayer. It was indeed a great meeting with us all and our God!. Audrey has had a step by step road to recovery since! The doctors have reduced her intake of Prednisone and she is still doing well this week! We are all claiming Audrey's recovery and healing and giving praises to our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
I heard a sermon a couple of weeks ago that was entitled "What is in your hand?" It starts out with the story about God asking Moses what was in his hand. Moses answered that it was his staff. God said throw it down and when he did it turned into the serpent. That was the staff that Moses used to part the seas and made the water flow from the rock. I asked what is in my hand and I realized it was the V-Picks. Now I try to keep one with me at all times. If I get on the subject of blessings or God or a sick dauughter or whatever, I tell the V-Pick/God story and hand the person a V-Pick for a reminder of our Father's goodness. Even if they are not a guitar player! It doesn't matter. I just love telling the story of what God has done in this household. He is a great God.
I have grown a lot this year. It has been a long winter and all I can really remember of it is that it was very dark. I have learned a tremendous lesson however. I have learned who we belong to. I have learned a lesson about being dependent upon The One who knows every hair on our heads. I now know that He who knows of every sparrow that falls to the ground actually cares about us. That is both humbling and encouraging to me and I wanted to share all this with all of you.
Thanks for reading..........Do good things......
vinni
My daughter Audrey, got very sick this fall. She ended up in the hospital after being sick for 3 months. She was diagnosed with Lupus or some sort of auto immune dissorder like that. The bills stacked to the ceiling as you can imagine. Now, I make decent $$$ but not a great abundance and I have 80/20 insurance. However, insurance does not pay a lot of things that require "specialists". Anyway, as I drove home from the hospital one day, I prayed to God a simple prayer. "God, I have no idea how I'm going to pay all these bills. I need your help". That was it. I really don't consider myself a prayer warrior. Well folks, I am hear to say God answers prayers! Now let's switch to the other theme of the story. I am a guitar pick maker. I designed and make The V-Pick. It was in it's embryotic state and I was just sending samples to a lot of people all over the world that I knew from guitar forums as a form of market research. Well, one of these chaps said "You need to put these picks on the market and we can all buy them!" I said "OK. How much should I charge?" A couple of them and my wife came up with the price and the boys then advised me where I should post about my new product. That was the end of January. The pick business immediately went crazy and I am still making picks both night and day. This week I broke the $4K mark and I just started selling them at the end of January!!! We are not behind in our bills at all. I wish I could say that it is all fun money but it is going to pay bills and that is OK with me because that is what it was supposed to do. God heard my cry and answered! I am asolutely sold out to that opinion.
Please don't think I am trying to peddle my picks by telling you this story. I have wanted to write this story on the internet somewhere and this forum just hit me as the proper place to do it. As a matter of fact, I did write it one day and deleted it after about an hour not knowing if I should tell everyone in fear they may think i was just being a salesman. Please understand that is not the case.
I met a wonderful couple that live down the street from me and come to find out his name is Gabe Monzo. He is in the band Malo with Jorge Santana. He knows Carlos Santana personally! Gabe and his wife Dawn are long time believers and now go to church with us. They came down a couple of weeks ago and we all laid hands on Audrey and prayed. The Holy Spirit filled the room. We all felt a feeling of warmth come over us like the room got very hot and we all had tears on our cheeks after the prayer. It was indeed a great meeting with us all and our God!. Audrey has had a step by step road to recovery since! The doctors have reduced her intake of Prednisone and she is still doing well this week! We are all claiming Audrey's recovery and healing and giving praises to our God and Savior Jesus Christ.
I heard a sermon a couple of weeks ago that was entitled "What is in your hand?" It starts out with the story about God asking Moses what was in his hand. Moses answered that it was his staff. God said throw it down and when he did it turned into the serpent. That was the staff that Moses used to part the seas and made the water flow from the rock. I asked what is in my hand and I realized it was the V-Picks. Now I try to keep one with me at all times. If I get on the subject of blessings or God or a sick dauughter or whatever, I tell the V-Pick/God story and hand the person a V-Pick for a reminder of our Father's goodness. Even if they are not a guitar player! It doesn't matter. I just love telling the story of what God has done in this household. He is a great God.
I have grown a lot this year. It has been a long winter and all I can really remember of it is that it was very dark. I have learned a tremendous lesson however. I have learned who we belong to. I have learned a lesson about being dependent upon The One who knows every hair on our heads. I now know that He who knows of every sparrow that falls to the ground actually cares about us. That is both humbling and encouraging to me and I wanted to share all this with all of you.
Thanks for reading..........Do good things......
vinni