God Can Still Use Me — The Journey

From the Archives: 2009

Written by Jeff Dollar

I grew up in a Christian home. My dad was a preacher since I was 5 years old. We were in church every Sunday. In 1981, during a spring revival, I made a profession of faith and asked Jesus Christ into my life. I was 12 years old at the time. Later I got into things I didn’t have any business being in. I got away from God. All the while, though, I knew I was saved because I received chastisement from the Lord during that period.

Like the Prodigal Son in the Bible, I knew there was something better in life for me, and that’s what brought me back to God. I finally came to a point of realizing that this is not my life. It belongs to God. I rededicated my life at church and God cleaned me up just like 1 John 1:9 says.

Six months later I announced my call to preach. That was on February 15, 2005. I now pastor the Phoenix Baptist Church in Lansing. I’m still human. I still make mistakes. But God can still use me.

Being in the automobile dealership business gives me the opportunity to meet and witness to lots more people than I otherwise would. The business gives me the flexibility to take care of my pastoring duties and the folks at church are very understanding about my job responsibilities at the dealership. We built our business on Biblical principles and God has blessed and honored that.

Soon after I became pastor in 2006, God spoke clearly to me that we were supposed to feed Thanksgiving lunch to needy people in War, West Virginia. War is the second poorest county in the United States. I presented the idea to my congregation. I didn’t know where in the town of War we were supposed to provide this meal or how we were supposed to do it. I just knew God wanted us to feed those folks.

I began calling around to the churches in War and it turned out God was working at the same time in a church there that was looking to connect with churches outside their community. We met and eventually joined up with several other churches from our area to take 35 food boxes to needy people in War.

We went back at Christmas and had a Christmas party for the kids there. Since then we’ve had the opportunity to go back several more times to provide food and school supplies. I am so thankful to God for bringing me back to him and blessing me with a godly wife and two beautiful children. It is a great privilege to serve the Lord and preach the Gospel and I am grateful for it every day.