It was a hot Arkansas day in July when I drove Staci to a TV Station in Little Rock to perform on a talk show. Two days earlier, we received a call from a friend we had known years before, and he was elated to hear that we would be in the city as he, too, had just moved to Arkansas. Little did we know just how providential our uniting would prove to be on that day.

Staci and I shared our vision and passion for EMwomen (an organization we had developed for empowering women -- physically, mentally and spiritually) and how we felt God was encouraging us to use 2007 as a year of completion of the planning process and a time of perfecting the team to launch the vision. That is when Eric passionately began to tell us how God was challenging him with the same mandate of completion and perfection, but only in a much different way. He shared how he had not known his father for 30 years and yet felt he should find him and bring completion and closure to that area of his life before the year 2007 was through. He went on to tell us the story of his childhood memory of being 11 years old the day he came home from a friend’s house. As Eric walked up to the driveway, he saw his dad get into his work truck and begin pulling out of the driveway. Eric ran up to the side of the truck and asked his father where he was going. His father said that he had to go away. Eric said, “Where are you going? I want to come with you.” Eric’s dad told him to go inside and his mother would explain every thing. Perplexed, Eric went inside to find out, along with his other four siblings, that his father and mother would be getting a divorce and that they will not be seeing him again. Like a lot of kids, Eric and his four siblings grew up not knowing their dad.

Through many tears and emotions, Eric proceeded to tell us the story of how he, only a few weeks prior to our lunch, had flown to California to find his father after 30 years of separation.

Eric walked up to the door of the home he presumed to be his father’s and knocked. The door opened, and standing before him was a teenage boy. Eric immediately thought that this must be the wrong house and said to himself, "My dad’s too old to have a teenage boy at home." But he went on to ask, “Is Ernie Casterlon at home?” The boy said, “Yes” and called for the old man to come to the door. This was the moment of truth. The moment that Eric had waited for, almost his entire life -- the chance to see his dad, again. Click here to read more>>