I am a long-time listener from North Carolina and am a fisherman by trade, both sport and commercial. Although I am passionate about my job, the traveling began to weigh on me. Typically, once a month, I’d travel to the West Coast and run a boat for up to 2 weeks at a time.

Once, as I was preparing to leave for another trip, my 12-year-old son told me, “Dad, please don’t go,”. I did not want to leave but told him this was my job. Then, it was like the Lord was speaking through him. He said, “Dad, you don’t have to go.”

When he said that, I stopped and said, “Son, you are right. I don’t have to go, but since I’m committed to this trip, I would be wrong not to go. Besides, the boat owner has been good to our family. How about I retire at the end of the year?” When I said that, I was half joking, but my son totally agreed with me and said, “Okay.”

Let me be clear: I have been living paycheck to paycheck and am not in a position to retire. But after that, my desire to travel became less and less, and my desire to stay home grew.

As we got into 2023, on 2 occasions, my son reminded me of what I had said about retiring, and it weighed on me because I had said it. So I prayed, “Jesus, who am I to limit You? You are my source and provider. You can do anything. You multiplied the loaves and the fishes. You can provide for me to stay home.”

After that, I got a phone call to fish at the White Marlin Open. This is the largest marlin tournament in the world, and it was its 50th anniversary. There were 400 boats in it. Because of a breakdown of the boat, which I run full-time, I was able to freelance in the tournament.

On the last day of the tournament, I still had not caught a fish. I knew I was not where I needed to be, so I prayed, “Father, I know I’m not in the right place, but I’m not going anywhere else until I have the peace to move.”

Then, an hour later, I had peace to move, and with 3-and-a-half hours left in the tournament, we caught the only qualifying marlin and won a world record purse of $6.2 million. Talk about being at the right place at the right time in the Kairos year.