My Story

I was looking for a way to introduce myself; and God told me to let these guys do it.

If it were not for the saving grace of Jesus Christ, I would not be here today. In the 1980's I was diagnosed with severe bio-chemical depression over business related matters at the time. At the time, far little was known about depression, and I simply did not know what was wrong with me. I remember taking drives, day after day, with a loaded 357 magnum at my side. I would look for trees to run my Blazer into and even considered ending my life with a 660 volt piece of roll forming machinery we had in our warehouse, so my family could get the life insurance. You have no idea what it is like living in a dark world, detached from reality, and having your small son open the motor home door going 50+ m.p.h. and seeing him hanging on by his fingertips. Another story I will share in the future. I eventually was treated in Houston, put on amitriptylin, a great drug, and began to come out of the dark, dark world I was in. Our family had 3 corporations which consisted of my father's general construction company, a retail aluminum installation company; which was by far the most dominant force in the area at that time, and a wholesale manufacturing company which I personally ran and started; after turning over the retail arm of the business to another family member; a business that was very profitable and stable at that time. Our wholesale arm supplied products to the retail arm and other contractors in the area. The aluminum businesses did well for years, but later evolved into a situation which became completely unworkable; and made no business sense. The retail arm had undertaken a large venture with Sears to install patio covers etc. outside our home area. Sears later dropped the program and our retail arm was left holding the bag, after diverting their main focus outside our home area. I still hear whines of the wholesale arm put the retail arm out of business; but I don't think so. The retail arm began giving my father's construction company large amounts of money that should have been going to me as their supplier, as my father was sustaining heavy losses in his construction business. He had built an organization with equipment, personnel, and even an architect to draw plans for prospective customers, without the sales to sustain it. He never came to the realization that the metal building line he was representing was overpriced for our area. We would sit and argue night after night about my not being paid. I'll always remember him saying "we are all for one and one for all," and wanted the companies thrown into a big pot of no accountability, to cover up the losses, as did another member of my family after the Sears venture went sideways. I was the one being marched up to bank to borrow money, as the other 2 companies had exhausted their assets. It is very difficult to sustain a business when you are not being paid for the product that moves out the door and I did not need to borrow money, I needed to be paid by the retail arm for the product they were purchasing. I had 3 children at the time, had lost my health over the tremendous stress, and I believe with all my heart that God told me to leave the situation. I left the companies in 1985 after devoting 16 years to the family business that I loved, and dreams die hard when they don't come true. I had gotten down on my knees and cried before my father and my mother, begging him to sell the companies, or at least take on an investor, and told him what he was doing would not work. I remember vividly the day I walked in to his construction office to tell him I had had enough. He told me he had talked things over with another family member and "they could handle it if I needed to leave." There must have been great rejoicing when I left. When I left, the retail arm owed my wholesale arm $176,000 +-, which I could not collect. Our wholesale inventory was right @ $225,000. I had tried to initiate a salary cut of 10% until my father and another family member would have no part of it. I was recently confronted by a family member who said he wanted an apology for running out on my dad and leaving him with the situation and problems. I have had a difficult time dealing mentally with such a bold faced lie. Oh my word, honey, does that sound like a Christian kind of statement? I ran a wonderful wholesale supply business and even tried to buy out his retail arm of the companies to help clean up the mess; to no avail. The banks at the time were going broke and calling in loans; and our bank went broke; and was acquired by another. If the bankers would have simply called me up and told me they were going broke, I'm sure I wouldn't have fought with them so much. I loved my father with all my heart and dropped out of college in my junior year to support his acquisition of the companies. He left a very successful career in the car industry to pursue a new field he knew nothing about. He was a wonderful man who had a dream of a large construction company; a dream that God never shared for his life. When I left the companies, something told me the years might be filled with lies and slander about what had happened. I have posted this part of my life to clarify some of the facts for my old friends and acquaintances. My biggest regret and sorrow comes from the lives and futures that were affected by my leaving; as I was surrounded by a group of Godly men. I wish there would have been a solution other than my leaving; but others would not hear things that would have made sense. There are some parts of the Bible that deal with forgiveness, other parts deal with condemning others, and others parts with judging others; but the entire Bible deals with what is true, and what is not; and we must find truth, before we address the others. As God is my witness in Heaven, I will always strive to make sure everything I post to this site is the truth. I hope you can laugh with me, and cry with me, and will let me show you things from the word of God that you've never heard before. I will be adding to this site in God's timing, and will address the very hard issues that most of our Pastors today don't want to talk about any more, and will post any valid objection from any group or person that knows what they are talking about and can back it up with scripture from the Bible. I hope you will enjoy listening to the adventures of Craig D. Holland, and will come to the saving grace of Jesus Christ my Lord, and my Savior. Paul said " There will be a falling away first; and then the end will come". There has certainly been a falling away from God in America, and I firmly believe God has already set in motion the end of this world as we know it. I hope to travel and preach on the things that God has shown me out of his word. We are all a work in progress, and some of us just need a little extra time in the oven to bake, and God calls who he will to accomplish his purposes. I get very excited to think that Jesus is building me a mansion in Heaven. I hope he's building you one too. I was saved at a young age in my local church, but I never really knew who Jesus was until I started walking through the storms of life. He's always been there for me, and he's the only thing in this world that really matters. What a blessing the Gaither's have been to the world.
I guess this song will always be my own personal national anthem.

I wrote the Mother's Love piece shortly after being thrown in jail by Judge Peter Michael Curry of San Antonio back in the late 80's. There was another episode in the mid 90's for violating probation I did not know I was on; for being behind on my child support. At the time I simply didn't believe what happened to me could happen in America; but I was very wrong. I had no lawyer, and told Judge Curry I had basically lost my job; a commission only job, and needed to get the amount I was paying adjusted. I had paid about 8 months of child support after a divorce and willingly settled on an amount, out of court, to take care of my children. I reasoned that if I could not afford my child support, how could I afford a lawyer. It turned out to be a big mistake. Judge Curry ordered me to pay the regular amount plus an additional, which I believe was $500.00, to get caught up, and see him again in 30 days. When I asked him where I was going to get the money, he said he didn't care and if I needed to "steal it ". My mother had just inherited 3 bankrupt companies and a condo at South Padre Island which she was struggling to pay for, that had been dumped in her lap by the companies. She has since been blessed by God and wonderfully successful, but at the time was struggling to make ends meet, as the companies were taking almost, as she says, everything she had; while others lived the good life trying to keep up with the Jones es. My father, who owned controlling interest in the companies, had just died of cancer. My ex wife made a case with Judge Curry that I could have gone back to the Valley and worked for the old companies I started; which was simply not the case. After I got out of jail, my mother asked me to go to work for the companies to get things turned around, but another member of my family wanted no part of me being in his domain where he had sole control, and could do what ever he wanted with the finances. Quite ironic after making the statement to me about running out on my father and leaving him with the problems. I went to work for him at a salary of I believe $1,000 a month to help turn the situation around and left after about a week, seeing that their would be no sacrifice to make things better. I will post the full story at a later date, God willing. I am told that my father had a $200,000 life insurance policy with the companies and a mere $10,000 of other insurance. My mother tells me the story of some very troublesome arguments over the life insurance with another family member and his wife, and the fact that she never received a dime of the company insurance money, after years of the companies coming to her for money to stay afloat. She says she sat down one night and cried her eyes out by her pool over the situation, when God told her to let go of the companies she had controlling interest of. Very obviously, she was not a part of the plans. Maybe my ex-wife thought my mother had the insurance money and should take care of my problems. I was in San Antonio at the time and my mother tells me a member of my ex-wife's family went to her church and asked for canned goods for my children; I guess an obvious attempt to embarrass my mother. I assure you my children were never in jeopardy. At the second hearing with Judge Curry, I told him I had sent in a payment to the child support registry. My ex wife told him she had not received anything and he would not even take the time to check with the registry. I offered my check book; but he said, "if I listened to this kind of stuff, no one would ever get any money." I later found out my check had been received by the child support registry, but was not forwarded to my ex-wife and got lost in the mail; -- maybe?? He took me out of the main, full courtroom, to an empty side courtroom; and ordered me to jail. I often wonder why he didn't just do what I think he had planned to do in the full courtroom before others who could witness it. I was wearing a $14 watch and remember the bailiff looking at me and asking me why I had not sold the watch for the money to pay my child support. I stayed in jail for 30 days out of anger and protest that our justice system had turned into a legal system, and the fact that it seemed to me that they were simply trying to make my problems, my mother's burden; another burden I didn't think she could handle at the time. Maybe that was wrong; but it was right in my eyes. Please understand that I have no ill feelings towards my ex wife and that she did, what she did, over the stress of trying to work and raise 3 children at the same time; a monumental task. I did not want the divorce and I hope others will learn that violating God's ways and splitting your family may not end up being the cakewalk you thought it would be. Back in the 80's society began a stigma over child support; that if a father is not paying his child support, he is a no good dirty dog. I spent 30 days in jail with some men that would not pay the child support if they were millionaires. I hope society can begin to realize that there are those that won't pay their child support, and there are those who can't pay their child support, because of circumstances that occur in life. I believe any person who has lost their job and income should be able to go before the Judge, be sworn in, and get it immediately adjusted, which is not the case today. If they lie or misstate their income, send them to jail for 6 months with no chance of bail. Maybe it can become Craig's law. I later hired a lawyer and got my support amount adjusted through a lengthy proceeding, and have paid every dime that I owed, and there is even more to this story I can address later. Please understand that I realize we are all to submit ourselves to the higher powers that God has set in place. In my opinion, Judge Curry was trying to make a name for himself at the time and it was well known by the lawyers in the area. Unfortunately, I have had little relationship with my children, other than my youngest son, because of the tremendous pain his actions have caused my family. I visited with a man who said Judge Curry was a Christian man, and his family seems to think he was a gentle man; and that may have been outside the courtroom; but he was a Judge who greatly abused his power, and with the rap of his gavel, destroyed families and violated people's basic human rights. You may say that the Judge has passed on and cannot defend himself; but you are very wrong. A few years later I went to the court stenographer to get a copy of the transcripts to write my Congressmen and Senators. She told me the records had been filed, and were unavailable. Judge Curry can even now defend his actions, and I can too. We only need the transcripts, if they haven't been doctored. I will defend my actions to my death; and I did nothing wrong other than being behind on my child support because of loss of income. Stay tuned, and we hope to bring you, the rest of the story. Please pray for our Judges and Pastors. So many have departed from the things that made this country great and we and have seen many, many Judges abuse their God given power. I am not looking for anyone's sympathy and this is not a self justification venture. I have done things in my life I greatly regret and wish I could change, and I certainly ask for everyone's forgiveness, but hopefully they have happened for God's purposes; and in the end; good things can come from them. I will certainly post changes to this site if any facts I have stated need to be corrected. I sometimes wonder if I am completely well. Years ago I went into a seafood restaurant where the restrooms said "Gulls, and Bouys." After a couple of beers, most people think a Gull means a guy; and I wish you could have seen my face when I opened the stall. Thank God she was a good sport; and they should not be doing that kind of thing to people. I have the greatest Mother in the world, besides your mother, who is now 89 living in San Antonio. You have no idea what she has endured in life and it is so wonderful that after all the family companies had closed their doors, God blessed her with incredible success and favor. I later wrote a tribute to her thanking her for all she has been in my life and I know why they wrote the song "Jesus and Mama always loved me."

As I look back over my life, I remember visiting my ex-wife and children after she struck out on her own and we were separated. She told me I should be out in the backyard playing with my children like most fathers would. I guess I am one of those fathers that don't wear panties well. Financial problems are so hard on marriages, and I found that the hardest thing about going broke is realizing you are. After having things, it takes quite a while to accept the reality that those days are gone. Try as best you can to live within your means in this materialistic world of ours and get things paid off. No debt is freedom; and you never know when your world can be turned upside down. I certainly was not as responsible as I should have been given the situation; and sometimes God lets you be a victim of circumstance. I remember my past employee friend telling me in the garage that day that my wife didn't need me any more; and to go take care of myself. Boy, did that change. My biggest regret is that our children were the losers. God hates divorce, and you need to keep your family together if there is any way possible. Please pray for my children.

An empty life or hard times, Jesus is just a prayer away

O.K. Craig, so the Lord has put you through some tough times in life.
So tell us what you really believe !

Special thanks to my mother and dad; who took me as a little boy to Church each week; even when I did not want to go; and lead me to the Great God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and his son Jesus Christ. I would have never made it through life without him. Thanks to the Gaither's and all the artists who have lent me their works through the wonderful gift of U Tube.