God has the victory

[trapperhoney]

I requested prayer for my son a couple days ago as he was facing a very daunting event in his life.  He started karate a little over four years ago.  We put him in karate because he was very socially backward and lacked self-confidence.  He had a rough start (for about a year he ran away from his sparring partners instead of actually fighting) but gradually he ran less and less.  About a year and a half after starting a new guy was brought into our dojo to teach.  The previous teacher had taken a new job and was no longer available on class nights.  This new guy had three black belts in three different martial arts.  He was articulate, patient, and just all around awesome.  Something sparked between him and my son.  I think he saw a lot of himself in Bradley when he was my son's age.  Bradley really looked up to him and really started working at his karate.  Two and a half years later, Bradley was standing out head and shoulders above every other student in our organization.  His kata is sharp -- both open hand and sword.  He still needs some work on his sparring, but he has vastly improved.  His kicks are something to be reckoned with.  Well, about last October 2-3 of our grandmaster's "former" black belts came back to the organization.  Long story short, they didn't like the changes the new guy had made.  Largely because he was teaching things they had never seen, knew nothing about, and basically made them look like they were incompetent.  They have been working behind the scenes to push this guy out.  Ever since this organization was founded, once you reached your second tip on your brown belt it was up to the grandmaster to decide when to give you your black belt.  Well, in the last couple of years he allowed himself to be pressured into giving out a couple black belts even though he didn't see them as worthy.  So he decided he needed to come up with a test.  That was announced last July just after my son received his second tip on his brown belt.  However, during the announcement it was also said that Bradley would be grandfathered in under the old method.  So, for months we dutifully and patiently waited for the grandmaster to award Bradley his belt.  The entire time Bradley has been there he as been extremely respectful of everyone, even of those jealous of him, he has been faithful (the only one with basically perfect attendance to class) he has been dutiful (coming in to the dojo each evening and cleaning the floors without being asked).  He has gone above and beyond to be respectful and responsible.  Others have even argued with the grandmaster over a minor detail, and yet they were still promoted only two weeks after the incident.  So anyway, the end of January, two days before the upcoming belt test, we are told that Bradley will have to test for his black belt.  Mind you, a test hasn't even been established yet.  Basically he was supposed to go out there and just perform like a monkey anything they pulled out of the air.  Well, my son tends to freeze up when put on the spot, and the grandmaster knew this.  Our son was not comfortable with the situation, and honestly we weren't either.  So, he decided not to do it, to wait until there was an established test.  Of course, we were also upset that all of a sudden, with no warning, he now had to test, with no explanation.  Later we learned that the jealous ones had been complaining and giving him grief behind the scenes.  If he had simply explained to us the situation and had laid out a simple outline of what Bradley could have expected on the test (all other belt tests tell you exactly what you have to do to prepare) we would have been agreeable.  But since we didn't "trust" the grandmaster he was basically going to "punish" Bradley.  It was at this point we began seeing inconsistent behavior with him, and it seemed like he had a complete personality change.  Then, just two weeks later he comes out and says that the training that had been going on for the past two and a half years was going to stop and we were going back to the way it had always been done.  This was very upsetting to the guy that had been working with Bradley during that time.  He had only come back to this organization because he'd been assured that they wanted to take a more traditional route and he would be able to teach his way.  So, after a couple weeks thinking about it, he approached us about going together to open a dojo closer to our homes (we both live almost an hour away from the dojo we'd been training at.)  The grandmaster had wanted one in our area for a long time.  The grandmaster kind of drug his feet, but he couldn't bring himself to say no.  So, the beginning of May we opened our new dojo.  Between February and May we were still going to our original dojo, but our sensei wasn't teaching and basically no teaching was going on at all.  They stood around and talked.  So for three months our son was getting stale and we were basically wasting our money.  Once we got our own dojo, though, they were able to go back to real training.  So, we decided that at the July belt test he would test for his black belt.  What we didn't know was that for the past two weeks our sensei had been barraged by one of the returned black belts (who had pretty much been given free rein to kind of run the organization) had been pestering him and trying to find out what Bradley would be teaching, etc. because they wanted to make sure he was up to par so as not to embarrass them -- as in, he wouldn't be up to standard.  I think more likely they wanted to take over Bradley's training, and we weren't about to let that happen.  So, at the belt test yesterday, by "luck" of the draw my son got the short stick so went last of the three who were testing (God was definitely in charge of that.)  By going last he could see what was expected of him, and he also saw how poorly the other two were doing that it gave him the confidence to get out there and calmly do what he needed to do.  He did his "signature" kata which by far outshone the other two.  Then they had to do kata that was picked by the judges.  They had to do more advanced kata.  Well, the one they gave him was the most difficult of the three, and he blew that one away too.  In his teaching he did not mess up at all.  He paused a couple times, but I think was more due to the heat and to catch his breath than freezing up, which he has been prone to do under stress.  The other two messed up rather badly.  One had to start over a couple times and the other had to be prompted 2-3 times on the next step to do.  Also, the technique he taught as a take-down is commonly used and taught as a block, but he showed beautifully how to move it from a block right into a take down.  They were blown away.  In the evaluation afterwards (which is done behind closed doors but all black belts were there so our sensei was in on it) they tried very hard to find an excuse to not pass him, but there was no way they could pass the other two and not pass him, so they reluctantly had to pass him.  Not all the black belts felt that way, there were only 2-3, but the one, like I said, is basically now running the organization.

When I got home last night, the Lord gave me this verse:

Psa 35:4 Let them be confounded and put to shame that seek after my soul: let them be turned back and brought to confusion that devise my hurt.

It wasn't until afterwards that we realized they had actually tried to plan Bradley's failure.  Yes, Bradley ended up embarrassing them, but not in the way they feared.  God had this fight and he saved the upright in heart.  My son's black belt is actually a testimony to God and not my son.  We have been humbled and encouraged.  I feel the Lord has great plans for him.

PRAISE THE LORD!

[John81]

Thank you for sharing that!

[trapperhoney]

it is so amazing and humbling it's impossible not to share!  God gets all the glory.