Well, it has begun. I am now writing my stories here for everyone to read and share. (Click Here to go to the Story Page) I have been praying about the best way to share them for the ast years because I had originally thought about writing them in book form. However, I have gotten so accustomed to blogging technology and I know that no matter what anyone else says or does, they might be able to steal my creative works, but they cannot steal my stories.

So, I hope these stories inspire and encourage and if you had any part in the stories, I encourage you to take a moment and comment on the stories. They will be posted in blog form, audio, text, video and podcasted as well. It would be neat if some of you that lived these stories with me would take a moment and share your side or version. I think it will create a bigger depiction if we all share our experience of these.

So, this should be really cool. I can’t wait to see what happens over time as this turns into some kind of online scrapbook of story.

Love you guys!
Blessings!
pd

You’ve Got to Be Joking

England

Chapter four Part 1

Tommy and I were the best of friends. Tom-Bo was the coolest person I have ever known. I never knew him to be truly mad at anyone in all the years that we were friends. Tommy and I became best friends really during our sophomore year even though leading up to it, we had been friends for longer than that. During the final days of our senior year at West Iredell, we decided to take a trip with his mom and aunt to Britain. We would be touring England, Wales and Scotland. Some of our stopping points would of course include: The Tower Bridge, Some of the beautiful Abbeys in London, the Cavern Club, Sir Walter Scott’s Home, Edinburgh Castle, Historic Bath and Stonehenge. It was an amazing time and truly eye opening since it was my first time outside the States.

Little did I know that this was no ordinary trip, this would be a trip of awakening and renaissance! This little farm boy had no idea what was in store for him overseas.

You’ve Got to Be Joking

the Letter

Chapter three

The years flew by and so did the styles. Do you remember the 80’s, that decade from Hades? HAHAHA. I do too. White jackets, pastel shirts, pleated pants and loafers were the rage. And then the 90’s with its rolled cuff jeans and horrible hair styles. The year was 1993. My new focus had become sports and school.

I had worked my way up into the top ten percent of the class, joined as many clubs as possible including: Latin, Science, Mu Alpha Theta, Beta Club, Quiz Bowl, and more, and lettered in more varsity sports than any person in my high-school previously; Cross-Country, Football, Track, Wrestling, Sports Management and Soccer, also playing a couple of other sports I did not letter in. I was Captain of the Team, All-Conference, MVP, Most-Improved, Scholar Athlete, Coca-Cola Athlete, and had won awards for everything from Editorial Cartooning and Art to Mathematics.

I was recruited to kick football by the University of Redlands, to play soccer at UNC Chapel Hill and had been recruited for Chemistry & soccer by NC State University.

I was one of the leaders of my drama team at my church and toured to about 80 venues over my three year tenure with the team at South River Baptist Church. From the outside in, it seemed that Dustin Hedrick had everything going for him, yet, though no one around me knew it, this was not the case.

The Offense

We were on the road at one of those many churches where the South River Baptist Church drama team ministered. We would travel every weekend to some church around the Southeast doing various revivals and events. Generally after we performed, Tim, our youth pastor would step up and share a brief testimony or closing and there would be a time of invitation. GOD always seemed faithful to move. There were so many churches where the effect was lasting or more far reaching than we knew.
Yet, it’s funny. Do you know how sometimes you can be doing something for so long that you begin to think that you are doing something so great for the LORD that HE should be happy to have you around? Have you ever felt like you’ve worked so hard and paid so many prices that the GOD should reward you accordingly? Has the ministry ever become who you are rather than what you do? Ever forgotten whose ministry it really is? I did. It happens subtly. Often it starts with just one thought, “…I have done this, I have done that. I am glad that I am at least not that sinning tax collector on the back row…” It’s so easy to lose sight of reality and so easy to marry yourself to your works rather than your first love.

It had been so many years since I even felt near GOD let alone connected to HIM or actually talking to HIM personally. He was just the guy who made sure that I tied conference record for number of kicks in the football game. It wasn’t that I didn’t pray. It was that I didn’t know the person I was praying to. I wonder if during those years whether HE even really knew me.
Well, back to the story… So, here I am serving a GOD I have lost touch with yet doing it with all my ability and time. In the bathroom before this event, I am talking with one of my friends. We were talking about what we were going to do over the next weekend and what our plans were. It was nothing out of sorts, but as I was talking, I said a curse word, nothing horrific, just a simple four-letter word. The funny thing is that I never really cursed. I never found a use for saying those words, yet at that exact moment, the true inside Dustin was coming out and he wanted to show off to his friends. Again, it wasn’t WHAT I said that was the real issue; it’s where it came from inside my heart. Whether I said one or one hundred different curse words didn’t matter at this point, because right at that exact moment, Tim had walked into the bathroom. And unbeknownst to me, heard the entire thing. He was shocked and broken!

The Heart

My heart had become this interesting house built for many different people. I had a front room that was for GOD, a back room that was for my sports, another couple of rooms for various girlfriends and friends, one more room for my awards and achievements and then in the very back, there was a closet. That closet was hidden around a corner, almost totally unlit and secluded. No one would have ever found it, had I not been in that little church, where the Presence of GOD constructed one opportunity, a window of time where everything would align for the real Dustin to be seen by someone that would call him to accountability.

The Letter

It started with…”I had no idea. You seem like you have everything together, looking great on the outside, yet inwardly, really hiding another person.”

I had gotten the letter in the mail and my mom had put it in my room. No one had opened it, however when I opened it, I knew exactly what was coming. Tim had heard me and there was heck to pay! I was so enraged that immediately before reading the letter, I wadded it up and threw it into the trash. Then I became so paranoid that someone would open the letter and know the truth that I pulled it out, still without reading it, and placed it in my top awards drawer. (I had so many awards that they took up two drawers, so I knew that no one would look through all of them and find the letter). A day went past and my curiosity got the best of me, so I had to open it and read more.

It went on to say, “You had me convinced that you were someone else than you really are. I mean, really Dustin, I thought that you were the leader of the group. I was convinced that you were the most Godly person in the youth ministry, yet the truth is that you have hidden behind a mask. So, do me a favor, do yourself a favor. Do this not for me, not for your parents, not for anyone else than yourself. Look deep inside yourself and be really honest and ask yourself, ‘Who am I?’”

Dustin Hedrick is:

1. A Soccer Player?
2. A Top Ten Percent Student?
3. A Musician?
4. A Drama Guy?
5. A Chemist?

Who or what had I become? Within moments I began to realize that I had become something or someone I didn’t know. It had all happened so fast. When had I made these decisions? Where did it all start? What were the points that I had changed? Who am I?

Decisions Determine Your Destiny

Every small decision we make actually adds to the sum of who we are. Where we think that the smallest things do not matter, we might be surprised to find, that they do. Each thing, added to your character is simply setting you up for success or failure.
Early on, I had learned that the people with the most success in High School were the ones who had the most fun and did the most stuff. So, being an introvert, I knew there was no chance for success unless I learned how to develop relationships. I started by writing a new concept on my hand every day. The first days I wrote, “talk less, listen more.” Then I went on to write, “Ask more questions about other people.” Every time I thought about it, I would look at the palm of my hand and read what I had written for the day. At each point during the day, I would then practice the concept. This made me a very popular conversationalist and general person in school. However, I never thought that the same concept was true for my Christian walk. It was something that had to be practiced, something that had to be learned. It was something that I had to take time and think about and should write not only on my hand, but my mind and heart as well.

My Decision

Never saying anything to Tim, I changed. I underwent major spiritual surgery and my spirit softened. That same year as I was playing soccer, I did my 7th or 8th slide tackle on the same guy and he illegally cleated my thigh. It left a charley-horse which when I jumped up triumphant to kick the ball, ended both my soccer, wrestling, and football kicking career with one kick down field. That next kick I made tore my quadricep, hyper-extended my knee and gave me tendonitis that still bothers me today. Later I would be told by the physical therapist at UNC that there is no way I could play. I could sit the bench.
That brings me to England.

You’ve Got to Be Joking

Friends

Chapter two

Have you ever had one of those friends who knew exactly what you’re thinking all the time? The kind of person that could end your next sentence before you even started it? Did you feel like you had to spend every waking moment with them? Inside your mind to you have a library of memories, cataloged and always available for recollection when you are sad, silent or alone?
That’s Joseph.

We were best friends from the beginning. It was a friendship that spanned almost three years. In the adult mind that seems like such a short time, however three years was an eternity. Whether it was running around the farm, catching snakes, fishing, swimming in the creek, picking up eggs, cleaning out stalls, playing in the mud, climbing trees, burning things, or just playing with the animals, it didn’t matter, everything was fun. It wasn’t necessarily what we did, and was that we did it together.

Joseph was the kind of friend that always included your little brother in whatever you are doing. We spent almost every weekend together. I’m not sure what our moms were thinking, maybe they just wanted us to leave them alone? But it didn’t matter, just as long as we got to hang out.

As a sit here and think about Joseph, so many stories flood my mind. I remember drawing and copying pictures and articles out of the encyclopedia. Our parents thought it was funny, but we thought it was really cool to be able to name and catalog what spiders and snakes we had found that day.

Joseph was the closest person to Jesus I knew. He was unconditionally caring and I never remember a moment that he didn’t smile. He had this infectious smile and laugh. You could not be angry at him, we was just so kind.

Joseph, let’s build a fort. It was raining outside, so Joseph’s mom Marlene allowed us to build a huge tent fort right in the middle of the floor in the living room. We took over the entire area. Indians, tigers and Skeletor were all after us and we were holding up against the imagined enemy with all vim and vigor. Those were good times that affected me for a lifetime.

If I were to end this story right here, you would think my life was fun and all happiness, however, it doesn’t end happily ever after. I will never forget one weekend that I didn’t want to go to Joseph’s I wanted to stay home and play by myself. We spent every weekend together and for some odd reason I didn’t want Joseph to come to my house. For years since, I have tried to ask myself just what I was thinking and why, however, hind sight is always twenty-twenty. There are some things we cannot allow ourselves to much time to focus on them.

That weekend, my parents received the worst phone call I can remember. Joseph was in critical condition in the hospital. He has been hit by a car. He was crossing the road as we had done so many times before to go to a small gas station that we used to always get candy from. As he was crossing the road, a 16 year old boy was turning the corner speeding in excess of 60 miles per hour. Joseph did not have a chance. He was hit and thrown off the road.

What makes this story worse is that same boy was in the church I attended where I had been baptized just a year and a half before. His dad was a deacon and family had long been members. This made it hard for years to come to even like church.
While Joseph lay in the hospital dying, my parents went to see him. They left my brother and I with my grandma Hass. As we waited, I remember lying on the floor with my face down, crying and praying that GOD would come and heal Joseph. I’m not even sure how much time transpired. Everything seemed to slow down around me. Have you ever had the experience of time slowing down? It seems like one moment can take thousands of years to live and at the same time, you can turn around and it’s been hours when you felt like you had been there just moments. No matter how long I had been there, it didn’t matter, time was moving on and there was no way to stop it, no way to go back and pray and ask GOD to roll the hours back to allow me one chance to change my part in the whole horrible story. There was no way I would ever be able to go back and invite Joseph to spend the night at my house rather than turning him down for the invitation to stay at his.

The door knocked, feet shuffled, voices mumbled and then I heard the words that would alter the direction and course of my life forever, “Honey, Joseph was hurt really bad and he didn’t make it. Joseph is dead.” The actual wording or vocabulary used escapes my mind at the moment, since it’s been so long and I had blocked it out of mind for over 13 years. The effect was still the same. For the next couple of years, I became a recluse, I remember not being able to play, I remember the depression, I can still feel the burning in my chest. Why had I lived and Joseph not? Why could I not get the memory of his casket out of my mind? Why did I often find myself in his funeral, there at his church in my memories? Why was I left to pray, “Oh GOD let me die like Joseph so I can see him again?” Why was I left with the recurring nightmare of; a monster that came up the stairs and drug my friend away? Why?

I remember the counseling, the preachers, the prayers, the stories and the absolute piles of bull-crap people used to say.

“I know exactly how you feel…”

“I’ve been there before…”

“You’ll see him again some day…”

“GOD just wanted another angel…”

BULL CRAP! So, I did what any bright young mind would do. After a couple of years, I blocked it all out. The only catch was that with it went ALL my memories with GOD involved. I figured that HE hadn’t gotten me through or saved Joseph, so obviously, HE just didn’t involve HIMSELF with the current affairs of men. Prayer became something I had to do instead of something I “got” to do. And the style of prayer went from personal, to one that sounded like I grew up in 1611 with the language of King James being the only true way to pray. “Thee, Thou, Thus, Saith, Shalt,words that end with a “ –th” and many other terms that are used in King James only circles. We weren’t a King James only house; however, my prayers became those hollow, callous kinds of prayers.
Church had lost its power. GOD was only watching. People had to protect themselves. I was alone.

You’ve got to be joking

Salvation

Chapter one

“Dustin,” I knew I heard what I heard, however the question was who had said it? And where did the voice come from? All I knew as I was minding my own business playing with my toys and out of nowhere someone or something was calling my name.
What would you do? You’re only six years old, you’ve barely entered kindergarten, your favorite thing in the world is star wars, the most important thing in your mind is whether mom or dad are gonna wash your Under Roos, and you just entered another world; one that Bible storybooks don’t explain, and Sunday school teachers don’t talk about.

Mom didn’t know what to say the first time I asked she’d called my name. But the second time I came to started to catch on. Son she said, “God is calling your name.” She very quickly told me the story of Samuel and how God had called his name. She told me that like Samuel, god was calling me to his service. She said Dustin, the Lord Jesus wants your heart. And she asked me, would you like to ask Jesus to come in your heart? What would you say? I mean God had just called your name, right? I said yes. After mom had led me through a prayer to accept the Lord Jesus as savior, she dedicated my life to the Lord’s service.
From that day I began to serve Jesus. It was an immediate reaction; I went to school and told everybody that they had to do it too. I felt so good inside I wanted everyone to feel the same way. And I still feel the same way today.

My story is a very unremarkable one. As a boy, I grew up on a large farm in Statesville, North Carolina out in the middle of the sticks. I was never addicted to drugs, I didn’t party, cause trouble, drink, and a stayed totally chaste (a virgin) until marriage. I played just about every sport I could and thought that was how I was going to spend my college career. I had no idea that God had other plans but that’s a later story. I still haven’t told you about my best friend Joseph.