“I was sitting on my parent’s front porch in Lexington … when the Holy Spirit lifted my head to witness the creation of a star on an evening blue sky.”
So begins the written document that summarizes what I have heard from my son Allan for more than a decade. He continued: “In February 2015 I was anointed an angel.”
It was a new assignment for him, and it was an unexpected journey for all of us. He is 50 years old now, and he began life in Louisville, grew up in Pittsburgh (where he and his brother Ike were baptized), and flourished in Owensboro in the church, school, and sport worlds. He played basketball at Palm Beach Atlantic University but graduated from Georgetown College, completing a degree in International Business.
The first sign of this new world came to us on a Friday night. Allan and I and my wife Jan were watching TV on a Friday night. He turned to me and said, out of the blue, “Dad, God wants you to rewrite the Bible.”
I stared at him, trying to process what he had said and why. He had just returned to the States from three months of traveling in Southeast Asia. He came home determined to get another degree, so he was taking a course in landscape architecture at the University of Kentucky. I do not know if and how he finished that course. But I do know that these intervening 20 plus years have taken us to places we have never dreamed.
His most re2cent document opens with these: “Next year, I am going to begin a very fun and holy journey. I hope all of you will participate.” It is not just the family he wishes to inspire, but populations of people in Kentucky, in the District of Columbia, and even throughout the world.
While his visions have gone through many editions, a few things have remained the same. Like the logo at the top of this page, the heart and the smile. This invokes his two most prominent proposals: the Captain of Love and the Lord of Smiles. They now appear on lapel buttons, refrigerator magnets, and even a full-size car door sign.
I smile every time I see any of these, and that is the first response Allan wants. The ultimate goal is what he calls The Palace of Heaven, but I don’t have a clear understanding of what that is and how it will happen. “The official beginning of heaven will be the year 2050,” he writes in the letter. “I plan on hosting a worldwide celebration and jubilee to honor the beginning of heaven.”
“Give these away to everybody,” I always say to him, referring to the pins and such. I try to wear mine all the time. I have one pinned to my shirt as I write this brief essay.
Doctors have names for some of the ways Allan lives his life, and he has spent his share of time in hospitals and still takes his medicine as prescribed every day. Maybe it helps, and maybe not; and I am not sure what I mean by that sentence. I don’t know what “helps” except a deep and abiding love for one of the most generous and compassionate persons I know. He works at Kroger, uses his SSI check to pay his rent, and just bought his own car. He lives by himself in Lexington but wishes our family lived within shouting distance (if not in the same big house, like we had in Owensboro).
There is a great deal in life I do not understand, primarily myself, and this is another one. But I know this: everybody is special in their own way, even if that way turns out to be far different than what it appeared to be at age 15 or 25.
We all love Allan. We wear the pins. We plan our gatherings to accommodate his schedule. He represents the best of us, and we are all better because of his character, his disposition, and his visions.
Allan is the angel we all need, and we are grateful God sent him to our family and to our world. You can buy a hat or wear a pin and join the movement for “a planet that is kind, gentle, and friendly.”
God bless Allan, the angel of God.
Dwight A. Moody, one proud dad
“I was sitting on my parent’s front porch in Lexington … when the Holy Spirit lifted my head to witness the creation of a star on an evening blue sky.”
So begins the written document that summarizes what I have heard from my son Allan for more than a decade. He continued: “In February 2015 I was anointed an angel.”
It was a new assignment for him, and it was an unexpected journey for all of us. He is 50 years old now, and he began life in Louisville, grew up in Pittsburgh (where he and his brother Ike were baptized), and flourished in Owensboro in the church, school, and sport worlds. He played basketball at Palm Beach Atlantic University but graduated from Georgetown College, completing a degree in International Business.
The first sign of this new world came to us on a Friday night. Allan and I and my wife Jan were watching TV on a Friday night. He turned to me and said, out of the blue, “Dad, God wants you to rewrite the Bible.”
I stared at him, trying to process what he had said and why. He had just returned to the States from three months of traveling in Southeast Asia. He came home determined to get another degree, so he was taking a course in landscape architecture at the University of Kentucky. I do not know if and how he finished that course. But I do know that these intervening 20 plus years have taken us to places we have never dreamed.
His most re2cent document opens with these: “Next year, I am going to begin a very fun and holy journey. I hope all of you will participate.” It is not just the family he wishes to inspire, but populations of people in Kentucky, in the District of Columbia, and even throughout the world.
While his visions have gone through many editions, a few things have remained the same. Like the logo at the top of this page, the heart and the smile. This invokes his two most prominent proposals: the Captain of Love and the Lord of Smiles. They now appear on lapel buttons, refrigerator magnets, and even a full-size car door sign.
I smile every time I see any of these, and that is the first response Allan wants. The ultimate goal is what he calls The Palace of Heaven, but I don’t have a clear understanding of what that is and how it will happen. “The official beginning of heaven will be the year 2050,” he writes in the letter. “I plan on hosting a worldwide celebration and jubilee to honor the beginning of heaven.”
“Give these away to everybody,” I always say to him, referring to the pins and such. I try to wear mine all the time. I have one pinned to my shirt as I write this brief essay.
Doctors have names for some of the ways Allan lives his life, and he has spent his share of time in hospitals and still takes his medicine as prescribed every day. Maybe it helps, and maybe not; and I am not sure what I mean by that sentence. I don’t know what “helps” except a deep and abiding love for one of the most generous and compassionate persons I know. He works at Kroger, uses his SSI check to pay his rent, and just bought his own car. He lives by himself in Lexington but wishes our family lived within shouting distance (if not in the same big house, like we had in Owensboro).
There is a great deal in life I do not understand, primarily myself, and this is another one. But I know this: everybody is special in their own way, even if that way turns out to be far different than what it appeared to be at age 15 or 25.
We all love Allan. We wear the pins. We plan our gatherings to accommodate his schedule. He represents the best of us, and we are all better because of his character, his disposition, and his visions.
Allan is the angel we all need, and we are grateful God sent him to our family and to our world. You can buy a hat or wear a pin and join the movement for “a planet that is kind, gentle, and friendly.”
God bless Allan, the angel of God.
Dwight A. Moody, one proud dad
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