Reaping the Harvest Ministries

Paul began drinking alcohol and experimenting with drugs at the age of 13. On October 9, 1987 at 25 years of age at 4:35am in the morning. Paul had been drunk, stoned and strung out on drugs for 3 days and nights on River Street in Savannah, GA. He was so inebriated that he could not even place a dime in the pay phone to call home.

The Bellhop at the Hyatt Regency Hotel dialed his home phone number and reached Paul’s mother. Paul’s mother sent his backslidden brother-in-law, Mike, to pick him up at the Hyatt Regency hotel at about 4:00am.

Mike once had a personal relationship with Jesus Christ but had gone back into loving the things of this world more than God. Every time his brother-in-law mentioned the name of Jesus, Paul’s heart felt as if it would beat out of his chest cavity.

As Mike literally “scraped” him up off the street curb to put him in the car, he began to tell him about the love of God and the plan of salvation as he placed him in the passenger's side of the car. The ride home from the Hyatt to where Paul was living at the time was about 12-15 minutes. Along that way, Mike kept telling Paul about the love of God and the plan of salvation, but Paul never responded with any kind of remarks or questions. However, two blocks from the house, Mike pulled the car over beside the woods near the canal and turned the car off. Mike began to be persistent in explaining God's love and the plan of salvation that God had for Paul. About 15 minutes later, Mike started the car back up and drove one block down and took a left and drove two blocks down, pulled up into his mom's circular driveway. Mike got out of the car and opened the door to Paul's house. As Mike was standing at the door, Paul got out of the car and suddenly realized that he was no longer inebriated, but standing underneath his own power...sober. Paul noticed that everything looked different, smelled different and simply seemed different. All Paul could remember was about that Christ that Mike had been telling him about. As Mike was standing at the door and Paul was in the driveway, Paul yelled to his brother-in-law, "Mike!" Mike turned around and said, "What Paul?" Paul said, "You'd better come back and give me that sinner's prayer you've been telling me about, because I would like to know that if He was to come back tonight, that I was going with Him." Mike began walking towards Paul at the car and Paul began walking towards Mike at the front door. Somewhere in the middle of the front yard, Paul fell down on his hands and knees with Mike standing next to Paul on his right side. Mike said, "Paul, repeat this sinner's prayer with me, son." He said it, I repeated it and a few seconds later Paul got up off of his hands and knees. When Paul stood up it felt as if someone had poured a bucket of water over his head and something ran all through his body. When Paul took his first step after being born again, it was like Paul stepped through a transparent maze. All the crack, all the marijuana, all the dope, all the pills, all the cocaine, all the lying, all the stealing, all the fornication and the list goes on...he left it all right there on the ground. Paul had taken his first step of victory!! Paul walked into the house and there on the couch in the living room was his mother. He sat down beside her and she began to cry. Paul said, "Mom, don't cry. Everything's going to be alright." Paul had seen his mother being abused for many years, being married to his father. His mother opened those big old brown eyes of hers and said, "Paul, these are not tears of sorrow, they are tears of joy...for my son has come home!!" They sat on the couch until Mike got home to Kay, Paul's sister, and told her what had happened. Kay had been believing for years for Paul to get saved. Kay had the prayer chain from the Bronx of New York and New Jersey area, all the way down to Homestead, Florida! Kay began to call those people and tell them of what had happened to her little brother. A few minutes later, Paul's mom started answering the many phone calls that had called the house to rejoice with his mother about what had happened. After several calls, Paul told his mother, "You'd better take that phone off the hook so we can get some sleep. We've got to go to church in a few hours!" Paul went to the back of the house and finally went to sleep about sunrise. Paul doesn't know if his mother ever went to sleep after finding out the news!! Paul does know that when he got up about seven and a half hours later at 1:20pm, he walked out of his bedroom, took a left into the bathroom and looked the mirror on the wall and saw something different. As he stood over the sink looking in the mirror, he dropped his face into his hands and looked back in the mirror again and simply couldn't believe what he saw. He walked back out the bathroom, through the dining room and took a left into the kitchen. In the kitchen, there's two windows. The first window he came to, he put his arms in the sill of the window and looked out. From the many days of wet weather, he could recognize his knee-prints in the ground from where he had just gotten saved hours ago. At that moment, Paul's mind began to race back to the many times he heard is mother praying at that very spot for his salvation. She would also read her Bible as she would put on her makeup while getting ready for work. Paul realized that he was saved only five feet from where his mother had always prayed at that window. While still cherishing those thoughts, Paul's mom, Elsie, came running across the kitchen floor and began lavishing love upon him and telling him what God was going to do and how He was going to use Paul to reach others. About fifteen minutes after Else embraced him, there was a knock at the door. It was Paul's five foot tall, ninety-eight pound sister, Kay. She joined in with Elsie and began having a Holy Ghost Hoe Down with Paul doing "Charismatic Calisthenics", but Kay broke loose as she was holding the Bible in her hand. She said, "In order for you to stay saved you've got to read this Bible. I've got it marked. Start with John 1:1, "In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God and the Word was God." You've got to read this thing every day!! Before you read, ask the Lord to give you wisdom, knowledge and understanding of His Word." Kay did not know that Paul did not know how to read. Elsie knew he had a serious problem and wanted to get him help, but Paul's dad, George, was more interested in raising him to fight, play sports and pursue academics. George would say, "Don't worry about him, he'll be alright." Of course, there was division in the family. Elsie was living for God, but George was lost. However, [Praise God!] sixty-six days before George died, he found the Lord as his Savior!! After Kay left, Elsie went back to cooking lunch and Paul went into the dining room and cleared off the table and sat down with the Bible that Kay had given him. Paul opened it up to where Kay had it marked in the book of John. He prayed as told by Kay and Paul attempted to read the Bible. Paul thought that now God had saved him, He was going to "zap" him and somehow teach him how to read also. Paul sat over the Word of God all that day until about 5:00pm. Suddenly, a car horn sounded outside and it was Mike and Kay...they were there to take Paul to a church at Tybee Island. Paul walked into the church for the evening service that Sunday and quickly recognized a few people that he knew from a school he used to attend. Paul was wondering, "Are all these people saved?" Paul was amazed that none of these people had ever told him about the love of God or the plan of salvation. Paul was mean, mischievous, cunning...maybe that was the reason. Paul was now standing in church with all of these people. Mike told the pastor that Paul had gotten saved only a few hours ago in his front yard. Pastor asked Mike to stand up and tell the congregation what had happened to Paul. The power of God zapped Mike and knocked him back in the pew. Paul stood up and told the church that he hadn't smoked any doped, drank any alcohol, slept with any women, looked at no dirty magazines...that he had been saved. The pastor replied, "I believe you are, son." For many weeks, Paul was heavily involved with the church. Any opportunity to participate, Paul was there. Paul had lots of questions about his faith and kept the pastor busy! About twenty-one days after he was saved, his pastor called him in his office and told him, "Paul, I know you can't read, write or spell, but the same God, Jesus, who saved you, can teach you how to read, write and spell." His pastor sparked something in Paul's heart that day. He told Paul, "If you will fast, pray and believe God, He'll do it!" Paul went home and was in the eleventh chapter of John, verse 22. God allowed Paul to comprehend that whole scripture that night,"But I know, that even now, whatsoever thou wilt ask of God, God will give it thee." God didn't just reach out of the pavilions of heaven and zap Paul and say, "Now you can read." But 635 days later, Paul had read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John four to six times over...all the way down to Revelations 22:21. Then he went back to Genesis 1:1 and read down to Malachi 4:6...which is the ENTIRE Word of God. Glory be to God!! The first book that Paul had ever started and finished in his life was the B-I-B-L-E!! After five years and four months of witnessing, preaching on River St outside the bars and saloons, giving his testimony at different churches and bringing people to the Lord, God was calling Paul into the ministry. Paul felt like he needed some instruction, so he attended two years of college. One year at Southeastern and the other at East Coast Bible College. While attending East Coast, God provided an opportunity for Paul to begin preaching at local churches. This metastasized into a full-time itinerant Evangelist preaching ministry. Paul has never looked back and has seen countless people all over the world saved, sanctified, filled with His presence and washed in His blood.