Our Next Goal 800 Bibles

Our Next Goal: 800 Bibles

We have made two purchases in recent days of Bibles, purchasing five Bibles each time.  We have now given 737 Bibles.  These have been the Marine's, Soldier's, Sailors, Airmen's, Coastguard and several to Fire Fighters and Law Enforcement. Natalie sells the Bibles to us for the price of $19.97 each, due to my consistency with my supplier, which is now Ruth's Christian Book Store.  If we did a number, that is $19.97 times 737, you can quickly see that we have invested $14717.89.  But our expense has exceeded that because we have only been getting our Bibles at $19.97 for the past year.  Before that, we had paid as high as $26.95 and then we received a discount to $24.65, all from our original supplier.  We used to have a detailed spreadsheet of our expenses in Microsoft Excel but someone sent a virus past all of my defenses and destroyed that so I had to start over.  Fortunately, I did keep another record but without the details. I knew how many we had given so I could just start there and add to it.  We have given several hundred since then.  So, the dollar number above is an estimate but at least is the minimum amount we have spent on Bibles.

I began to write this earlier and did not finish it at the time.  I almost began from scratch right now, but then I decided to keep the 737 and just update our information.  Now, December 10, 2013, we have increased our total Bibles purchased and donated to 775 Bibles.  I had to stretch and make some other sacrifices to do that but we were able to do so.

Someone said that we had spent enough to make a car payment.  We have spent enough to have bought a car.  It isn't a complaint, it's a feeling of joy, of doing something for people I don't know.  I am proud of our small mission and how much it has accomplished.  Let us go back and use that same $19.97 multiplied times the now 775 Bibles and the total dollar number is $15,476.45; then remember that the actual dollar amount exceeds that.  When we say that amount has been spent on Bibles, it is true, for any other costs,  such as mailing, driving to deliver Bibles, thank you cards, all other expenditures are just out of my pocket.  We count only the money spent on Bibles.

I try to maintain about $200.00 in the account used for buying Bibles but I looked and had just over $390.00 in the account, so I moved $390.00 to my active account, added $109.00 to that and paid for an additional 25 Military Bibles making our total donated now 800, which was the goal we hoped to reach sometime in 2014.  Well, today, December 12, 2013, we reached 800 Bibles, which also makes our expenditure exceed $16,000.

Many will benefit from this for the Christmas season.

Merry Christmas

God bless the women and men of the Armed Forces of the United States of America.

Stephen

What One Great Thing?

What One Great Thing?

It is a question that Bryan Tracy asks on his audio program, "The Psychology of Success."  Here is the complete question:  "What one great thing would you accomplish if you knew you could not fail?  It's not an easy question and requires thought, for someone like I am.  Maybe others, even many, have a quick and ready answer but I wanted to think mine out.  I began working from goals many years ago, in 1987 in fact.  I had set some goals before, and accomplished a number of them.

For example, when I was seventeen and in love and had a terribly crashed romance with my girlfriend, after I struggled with so many things, I quit school and enlisted in the United States Navy.  I was barely seventeen having my birthday in February and enlisting in March.  I went through Boot Camp in San Diego, then Radar "A" School in San Francisco and then boarded my ship, the USS Point Defiance (LSD-31) in December of 1961.  After I left the navy, I had a goal of finishing high school, which I did, in 1967, five years after my graduating class of 1962.  I was married, had a new son and a low paying, hard working job as a truck driver and cylinder gas delivery person.  Then I got a job with Phillips Petroleum Company (after my diploma) and I worked there for 33 1/2 years.  I started college when I was 29 and working for Phillips and as I went along in my career, I acquired college hours, got a better job, more hours, better job, etc.  So I had goals but I never grasped the power of goals until I began to study under Zig Ziglar.  What were my goals?  Well, too many to list here but let me highlight a few.  I set a goal to personally meet Zig, and did.  In fact, I am listed in his book, "Over theTop" on page 106, as Stephen Payne from Bartlesville, Oklahoma.  I set a goal to meet Stephen Covey, author of "The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People" and met him.  Then it was to meet Tom Hopkins; did: Meet Bryan Tracy; did.  I set a goal to learn Spanish.  I later became a Spanish interpreter and translator, worked in two jobs as an interpreter, taught Spanish, then I learned French, Italian, German, Russian, Mandarin Chinese and now I am busily learning Polish and I can speak, read and write Polish.  So, you can see why I had to think, "What one great thing?"

Years ago, I wrote out my personal mission statement, which is long, but the nutshell version is this: My mission is to learn, teach and give.  I do that.  I love learning and I've even been called The Learning Machine; I can't help teaching as it's in my nature and I give.  I give books.  I have given over 200 copies of The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, around one hundred copies of Joyce Hifler's book, "The Cherokee Feast of Days," a number of "The Magic of Thinking Big" and many other books.  Then I began to give the Marine's Bible to marines I could meet and find.  I began to give the Soldier's Bible, and as of this week, we have given 640 of the Holman Military Bibles.

Could I reach 1,000?  Yes, of course, as we are not so far from that.  We will reach 700 Bibles by the end of 2013 and then next year, more, so 1,000 is hardly a challenge then.  What one great thing?  I decided to set my goal as 10,000 Bibles to give and then some of the things Bryan said came back to me.  What one great thing would you accomplish if you KNEW you could not fail?  

My goal is to give 100,000 Holman Christian Standard Bibles to the men and women of our armed services.  That has now become my one great thing.  As some athletes have said, you miss all of the shots you don't take; as Jelly Bean Jones said, "The girl you don't ask out ain't going with you anyway."  So, I set a high goal, one so high I can not yet see it, but it's there now, carved in ink, and I'm on my way to it.

The photograph I chose?  Yes, that is I, in the tandem jump from 10,000 feet with Andy Beck, my jump master and I had a wonderful time.  I am 69 years of age now and made my first jump.  I did it to deal with my fear of height and it has worked pretty well so far.  It's part of my processes, to learn, to teach, and to give.  

We did a free fall for 38 seconds and it didn't feel like we were moving.  We hung in the air as we talked and I looked all around me, down, sideways, up, and I loved the feeling of sailing through the air, even downward.  Once the parachute opened, Andy taught me how to drive and let me go left, right, even spin us, and then we were down, landing softly, and I feel different today, a week and days since I went out of the airplane.  Jumping was a goal but not my one great thing.  But I know now what my one great thing is, to give 100,000 Bibles, and I cannot fail.

Stephen Joe "Red Boots" Payne

Meeting Officer Barnes

Meeting Officer Barnes

Officer Barnes is a police officer, a sergeant, with the Owasso, Oklahoma Police Department.  I was able to meet him last week because I was going too fast in the 35 MPH zone.  I saw his car and the lights come on as I had passed him and I was pretty sure that I was his target so I had begun to look for a safe place to pull off of 86th Street (westward bound) and I found one at the Mingo intersection.  He asked me, "Do you know why I stopped you?"  I said, "I assume I was going too fast."  He replied, "I had you at 41 in a 35 mph."  He asked to see my driver's license and I produced it for him.  He saw, recently added too, my status as a veteran and he thanked me for my service.  He verified my insurance and then he let me go with a verbal warning.  My tag on my Chevrolet HHR is a US Navy tag, so he saw that, and my Navy jacket.  We were talking a bit and I asked him if he had been in the service.  He said he not been but his wife was in the US Army reserve as a Chief Warrant Officer.  I explained our Bible program and offered one to his wife.  At the moment, I had 55 Soldier's Bibles in the back of the car, but all of them had been committed to the 45th Infantry Brigade in Norman, Oklahoma and they were waiting to be picked up by Sergeant Joseph Baker as soon as possible.  We had had some weather that prevented our connecting.

I told Sergeant Barnes that I would have her name printed on her Bible and I did as soon as I could, which was today.  On my trip to Owasso to have my HHR serviced, I stopped at the Owasso Police Department, a beautiful building, and left a Law Enforcement Bible for Sergeant Barnes, with his name printed on the cover.  I was able to get her name for the printing and when I returned to Tulsa this evening for Friday dinner, I again passed through Owasso and left her Bible there for him to pick up.

So, a chance encounter resulted in our placing two Bibles, one a Soldier's Bible and one a Law Enforcement Bible so, in a Forrest Gump moment, "Life is like a box of choc-o-lates.." I never quite know where a moment is going to lead me; but I always ask.  Since we began our program in 2005, we have now placed 518 of the Holman Christian Standard Bibles, with our military, police and fire.  

It is a small mission but one we have undertaken.  I can not provide these Bibles to every marine, soldier, sailor, coastguardsman, etc.  but I can to some.  I'm reminded of the story of the starfish and the little boy who was picking them up and casting them back to the sea in an attempt to save their lives.  An older man walked by and asked him what he was doing.  The boy explained and the man replied, "You can't possibly make a difference!  There are thousands of them on this beach."  The boy replied, as he tossed one into the sea, "Made a difference to that one!"

Maybe I make a difference to one soldier too.  

Stephen Joe "Red Boots" Payne

500 Bibles

50 Holman Soldier's Bibles

It happens, for various reasons, that I get behind on this journal.  All of this, of course, is written and posted via a computer and I usually use a PC but, in September, my PC went to the doctor for a serious virus infection and it had to be completely wiped and all data and the programs had to be restored.  One comment on that.  These people who write and send viruses are mean; it's just mean and uncalled for; it's theft as they steal from us our ideas and our work.

All of that has to do with this; I keep the records for the Bibles we have given on my computer using Microsoft Excel and I have not yet got all of the programs restored.  So, I have been keeping records with just a notepad.  Our goal was to increase our purchase and donations up to five hundred of the Bibles this calendar year, 2013.  We had some monetary donations to us last year and as I looked at our account, I saw that we could complete a purchase of fifty Bibles and still have a small operating fund left in the account.  Our goal is to provide Bibles, not keep cash on hand, so generally, we are happy with about $200 maintained in the account.

We had dinner at Garfield's last evening, February 3, and after that, I walked over to nearby Ruth's Christian Book Store, ordered and paid for fifty Soldier's Bibles.  I took ten from the store's stock and forty will be on the way to me in a few days.

As mentioned in previous posts, these are Holman Christian Standard Bibles (HCSB), and they are in the series of Marines, Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Coastguardsmans Bibles.  Most of those we have given have been the Soldier's Bible and the Marine's Bible but we have given of each in the series, plus a few for police and fire.  More than one hundred of the Bibles have been the Marine's Bible and now over two hundred have been Soldier's Bibles.  I do not have the exact figures on that right now.  The Bibles now cost me $19.99 with the discount that my supplier gives me so the fifty we purchased yesterday cost $999.50.  These is the second time we have been able to purchase fifty at one time.  The last purchased fifty were shipped directly to the 75th Ranger Regiment at an undisclosed location over there.

Driving me to make the purchase now was my goal to reach 500 Bibles in 2013 and I'm pleased that we have done that.  Pleased is understated; I am overjoyed to have reached the goal of 500.  Note that it now costs $19.99, but in the past, before I was offered any discounts, I was paying as much as $26.00 per Bible and then it was lowered to $24.00.  Simple multiplication of $19.99 times 500 would show you an expenditure of $9,995.00 and then when you add the many Bibles that we purchased at the higher prices, you can quickly see that we have exceeded $10,000.  It is not about the amount of the dollar, it is about the quality of the Bible and these are good Bibles and I've been proud to give them to our service women and men.

I wish to thank the donors we have had and with their permission, I would identify them, but I do not yet have permission.

Stephen Joe "Red Boots" Payne

Chance Encounters to Bibles

It is September 17, 2012 and I have failed to make the updates here that I planned.  And, today, I do not yet have a photograph that I would like to post with the page but I will find one soon and update this page with it.  Chance encounters sometimes turn in to opportunities to give a Bible to one of our service men or women.

I have been working with Jay and Susan Hurt and others to bring about the 50th reunion for my Pawhuska High School class of 1962 and as we went along, I spent small sums of money on it.  I bought stamps, a file for record keeping, a plastic box to hold envelopes, envelopes, business cards, several things along that line. And I had intended all along to leave what I spent on the table for the reunion so that proceeds would be donated to the Pawhuska Educational Trust Fund (and I may have its title incorrect).  Last week, the Hurts insisted on settling money with me and returned to me $280.00 which I tried to get them to keep but, well, they were very insistent and said that I could use the money for my vacation to Santa Fe.  I did not feel right keeping the money as it was never my intention.  So, I decided to invest in Bibles.  I had $280.00 plus $20.00 that John Main had paid me for a few photographs I had printed of him, and I told him I could not charge him, a long time friend of so many years, but I would accept a donation for Bibles.  With that, I had $300.00 plus the donation that a gentleman in Tulsa makes plus my $100.00 so we soon had $500.00.  I took the money to my financial organization and deposited it in the account for Bibles.  When I specified the account, the young lady waiting on me asked, politely, "May I ask, (raising her brow), do you give Bibles to the military?"  "Yes," I replied, "We give military Bibles to Marines, Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, the whole smear across the board."  She then told me that she knew of a unit in Afghanistan who would like to receive Bibles.  I got her name, e-mail and told her how to find my blog here on the Bibles and I went to Ruth's Christian Book store up the road in the Washington Park Mall.  I ordered thirty Soldier's Bibles with the intent to take them to the larger recruiting station in Tulsa, as I have done now for some seventy Bibles.  I was just thinking that this delivery would make one hundred Bibles delivered to that office.  The soldier I had just met, Jessica Beach, weighed on my thoughts, and through our e-mails, I got her name correctly, took one of the Soldier's Bibles I had at home back to Ruth's and asked for Jessica's name to be printed on it.  I delivered it to her in the late morning and then confirmed a few things we had talked about with the unit she asked me to ship to.  At this writing, we plan to divert this order of thirty to that unit.  Yes, there will be a few more complications than just driving sixty miles to deliver them, but I hope the station has enough Bibles for a while to allow me to send this order to the unit.  I have a few more e-mails to exchange with Jessica and the sergeant but then they will be on their way where I know they will be received well.

See how a chance encounter with someone turned out to be good?

Stephen

Blue Star Mothers Bartlesville, Oklahoma

Anita Scaler (seated) and Della Wilson (standing)
Washington Park Mall, August 4, 2012

Blue Star Mothers Bartlesville, Oklahoma

I like to use something visual with my writing and my original plan for this page was to be photographs of the new edition of the Holman Military Branch Bibles.  I bought three just for photographs, but I have not yet made the photographs.  These three Bibles will be given away to a Soldier, an Airman and a Marine as soon as I have completed photographs of them for this blog.

I have purchased Bibles from Living Word Store in Washington Park Mall, in Bartlesville, owned by Melvin Nichols, for about four or five years now.  Melvin has retired and closed the store in February but he continued to fill my needs from his home until the recent opening of Ruth's Christian Store, also in the mall but at a different location.  On Saturday, August 4, we purchased five Soldier's Bibles and gave them to the women of the Blue Star Mothers seen in this photograph to give to any soldier, wife of a soldier, mom of a soldier, who came by and asked about the Bible since one was displayed prominently in the center of the exhibit.  By the end of the day, four of the Bibles had found homes.  The Blue Star Mothers have home made items which they sell at the monthly exhibit for fund raising.  I asked them to just say that the Bibles were paid for and to take it to Ruth's for imprinting of the soldier's name on the Bible.  I also arranged for five military Bibles to be paid for and kept in the store.  It was just a blanket payment for any military Bible on the shelf so that a dependent could pick it up, take it over to the cashier, and then be told that her or his Bible had been paid for.  I was pleased to learn today that four Bibles were taken.  I don't know the branch or who took them; I only know that it was a blessing to several of them.  In fact, the lady who waited on me today, when I bought an Airman's Bible for my young cousin serving in Japan, whom I have not yet met, told me that a young wife had told her that she wanted to get a Bible for her army husband but could not afford it.  Ellie told the young wife, "Your Bible has been paid for so all you have to do is  pick one out, bring it over and we'll print his name on it."

My Aunt, Julia Hardy Griffin, was a Gold Star Mother of World War II.  This is not good for to be a Gold Star Mother, you must lose a son or daughter in war.  My older cousin, Bennett Griffin, her son, was lost in battle in 1944, possibly in the Battle of the Bulge.  I only knew him through photographs, his ribbons and medals and the grave I visit in Pawhuska, Oklahoma.

The Blue Star Mothers is an organization of the mothers of servicemen but it's not restricted just to mothers.  In a official capacity, yes, but there are auxiliary volunteers and young women who help by volunteering time and energy for fund raising efforts.  I help here in the smallest of ways.  I attend their fund raising efforts, breakfast once each month, the exhibit and sales they have at the mall once a month and other small ways.  I photograph events when I can and I share the photographs on Facebook and Flickr.  I also photograph the service men and women and give them or the families portraits when I have made a good one.

But my main contribution is what I do in giving the military Bibles.  Most of the expense has been borne by me, and my wife has helped in contributions as well.  Then we have had a few contributors.  We have not solicited funds with the exception of when I told the Pawhuska Methodist Men's Group that we would accept a donation and they generously provided us with $200.00.  We have one consistent contributor and I do not have permission to publish his name yet.  And, a former marine who is from my home town of Pawhuska contributed $500.00.  With $100.00 we can furnish five Bibles to service men and women.

I had said that our total was about 275 Bibles and I thought that to be correct.  But, alas, my Excel program tells me that we have provided 257 Bibles and our expense for Bibles has been $6,057.24 for Bibles.  Any mailing costs are separate and I absorb those without keeping a record; I just buy a box and pay for mailing and consider it a minor expense.  The Bibles are the main thing.

Along with the Blue Star Mothers, I am the Red Shirt Fridays for our area.  I tell people about Red Shirt Fridays and I  have shirts I have purchased from the Red Shirt group but, so far, I seem to be the only person here who is involved in Red Shirt Fridays.

Our efforts are small and we what we do with our Bible project is small, but it's still something and I'll do it as long as I can.

Stephen Joe "Red Boots" Payne

Report on Bibles Delivered Veteran's Day 2011

SFC Nic Ninkovich, United States Army (photograph by Red Boots)

I have failed to write here for some time and so I have not reported.  As of today, 11-11-11, or November 11, 2011, we have given 165 Holman Military Service Branch Bibles.  We have given 101 Bibles to members of the United States Marine Corps (USMC), 39 to soldiers of the United States Army, 16 to sailors of the United States Navy (including my own Sailor's Bible), 4 to members of the United States Air Force, 1 to a Coastguardsman and 4 have gone to police and firemen.  Our cost for this project has been $4,227 for Bibles alone.  We have had associated mailing and packaging expenses also, but I have erred in not keeping detailed records on those expenses.  I think we have done quite a job considering that we are just one person with limited resources but, make no mistake about a man with a mission; it can be done.

We have had $100.00 in donations from other people and I did some work for an old friend, computer and photography, who wanted to pay me.  I could not accept money from her for I owe her and her husband so much for the kindnesses I have received from them over the years.  I owe them for the friendship they have provided me, and for the care for my son.  Their daughter was the first young woman to baby sit for us and they were a comfort to me when I lost my son.  How could I take money from her for something that I love to do?  Then she asked, "Stephen, what about your Bible project?  What if I gave you money for it?"  How could I refuse that, gifts for marines and soldiers?  I couldn't so she bought two Bibles.  The rest has been from my pockets.

I met a man at my favorite restaurant in Tulsa, The Longhorn Steakhouse, and I was wearing a ball cap with "USS Point Defiance (LSD-31)" and a ship logo on it, so, it was natural to talk about our service.  I learned he had been career Army, starting as an enlisted man and becoming an officer and rising to retire as a Lieutenant Colonel.  We exchanged business cards and I mailed him a Soldier's Bible with his name on it.  Sometime later, I received a wonderful letter from him in which he wrote that he would like to contribute, and generously.  I just replied to him and then today, I began a search for an attorney to talk to about setting up a nonprofit organization for this mission.  I have had one conversation with an attorney, one who served in the Marine Corps, and I will likely follow up with him to see if this is something I can do.  Any money I spend on attornies is money not spent on Bibles and I have to focus and remember what our mission is.  "Our mission to give Military Service Branch Bibles, The Marine's Bible, The Soldier's Bible, The Sailor's Bible, to the enlisted men and women and officers of the United States Armed Forces, and veterans, to the best of our ability, for as long as we are able."