Before moving to the Moravian Falls area in 2003, our home was on the coast of North Carolina. After attending church faithfully for decades....I was standing in church one Sunday morning in the early summer of 2001 and I heard the Lord say, "You are done". Well, I am a southerner and he speaks to me in "southern". I knew that I was to leave that church, but I had nowhere to go. After the service was over, I told my daughter what I had heard, but that I didn't know where to go. She said, "Go home". Well, I "knew" better than that! Christians go to church on Sunday morning and I wasn't about to go home and not go to church. (After all, I didn't want to go to hell!) So, I found another church. The teaching was good and the worship was great! However, there was no peace and no grace to be there... after awhile...I went home.

We have three children and they were all brought up in the church their whole lives. During their college years, it became apparent that their relationship was with the church more than it was with the Lord. I found out the same thing about myself. All three children struggled with their Christian experience. Our daughter's relationship with the Lord survived, but our sons fell into sin.

In December, 2000, our daughter received a prophetic Word that "both of her brothers were coming back to the Lord" in the next year. Well now, I had never been around the "prophetic" very much, but I realized that THIS "word" wouldn't be too hard to check out. On May 17, 2001, our oldest son came back to the Lord and on November 10, 2001, our youngest son came back to the Lord. (Each of their conversions is an amazing testimony in itself.)

A friend of ours, Sandy, and her family had a similar experience with the Lord. He revealed to her, the spiritual death of her children if she did not leave the church that she was in. To make a long story short, in the summer of 2001, we began having a Home Group in our home. Sandy led the home group and my wife and I would get upset because she had no agenda and that really bothered our religious spirits. We always shared a meal and when we sat down together, she would look at my son, who had come back to the Lord in May, and say, "What is the Lord saying to you, today?". Later on, MorningStar started a School of the Spirit meeting on Friday nights. It was about a two-hour drive, one way, but on Friday nights that is where we were.

Do you have to do that? Of course not. But. even though I had been in church for many, many years, I was an immature, ineffective christian. I needed help. I needed training.

After going to the S.O.S for nearly two years, we felt that maybe we should move to Charlotte, NC to become a part of the MorningStar congregation. Three things needed to happen for us to move. We had to be released from a lease agreement for a building that our financial services business was in. We had to sell our boat because it was too big for a mountain lake and we had to sell our house.

None of those things happened. No one even looked at our house.

Several months passed. One day, my wife felt (we now know that is how she hears from the Lord.) that we should look at the Moravian Falls area. Well, I had no desire to try it again. God had made it pretty plain, to me, that we were to stay on the coast of North Carolina. One day, I went to the garage and picked up the "For Sale by Owner" sign and started to put it on the lawn...I changed my mind and put it back in the garage. On July 17, 2003, at around 4:00 p.m., I decided to put the sign in the yard. The next morning at around 9:20 a.m., I received a call about the house. Seven hours later, we had a contract on the house. Over a period of weeks, we were released from the business lease agreement and we sold our boat.

After moving to the Moravian Falls area, our "church family" has been restored...greater than ever. After all, the church is God's idea. Man has messed it up, but He will restore it in your life if you will allow Him to.

Today, all three of our children are in ministry. Was Moravian Falls the answer? No. God is the answer. Simply follow Him. He will direct your paths.

I encourage you to continue to follow Him. He WILL direct your paths. Where do you need to live? My daughter has the perfect answer: "There is no better place to be than where God has called you to be." Seek Him for that answer.

I hope that you enjoy the beauty and essence of our prints of Moravian Falls.

- Jerry D. Bell

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