Interview and Discussion
Bio
Keith and Sheri married at age 19 while students at NMSU in Las Cruces, NM on July 5, 1975. Sheri graduated with my BS-Edu and began teaching while Keith continued his undergraduate degree. He finished with his BSOE from Wayland Baptist University in Plainview, TX, then his MDiv from Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary in Mill Valley, CA.
We did youth ministry and pastored in TX, CA, and NM for a total of 42 years. Of those years, we pastored in Reserve, NM from 1986-2021.
The first ten years, Keith served as senior pastor of Reserve Baptist Church, then we served together as the founding pastors of an independent non-denominational church, called Joy Fellowship.
Sheri taught public school in TX and CA, then when we moved to Reserve, Sheri and Keith homeschooled our children through high school. Sheri later worked managing a title insurance company. Keith worked bivocationally in County government, and I eventually got a job in county government as well. They both retired on January 1, 2021.
They have a daughter named Bree (43), who is married to, Jonathan Mooney, the son of our missionaries to Guatemala. (www.bethelministriesinternational.com)
They have Selah (16) and Moses (13) and live in Manchester, CT.
We, also, have a son named Adam (40), married to Danielle (37). They have Ember (15), Jubilee (12) and Ephraim (6). Their family moved from AL to Lubbock, TX last year.
Keith and I moved to Lubbock to caregive my parents who subsequently passed away within 15 months of each other. The LORD has clearly assigned us to a new manifestation of ministry here in TX as intercessors. While we do own our house and property in NM, we now claim Lubbock as home.The Journey
The Riddles share with us their journey out of “Babylon”, and into trusting God as provider. Through radical giving, trusting, faith, perseverance and endurance.
The Journey
We, too, have had cyclical opportunities to experience the release from the Babylonian system. Each time we have grown exponentially in our faith and obedience. I think it truly is a part of GOD’s way of dealing with His children as He liberates and matures us.
When we were led by GOD in 1996 to come out of our denominational system, we chose to leave behind our housing, paycheck, annuities, statewide influence, appointed leadership positions, reputations within our community, etc. We lived as an homeless, unemployed family, with two tween-agers whom I was homeschooling, for three months; but by GOD’s grace we had provision for each day! Keith held a BS-Occupational Educ and MDiv degrees, and I had my BS-Educ with experience in public education, but for reasons only GOD knew, we couldn’t land a local job for those three months.
Why? He was building our trust in Him as our Provider, instead of our denomination. The repeated saying: “Baptist born. Baptist bred. And when I’m gone, I’ll be Baptist dead!” Our denomination had become a type of Babylon for us, although at the time we actually referred to it as Egypt. We had to take every word and thought captive daily so as not to be like the grumbling children of Israel in the desert! We pressed on to be fully free, whatever that looked like for our family, even when other churches in the surrounding states offered Keith positions. As we prayed through each offer, we felt the total shalom of GOD that we were where He wanted us, even if we never enjoyed the prosperity and prestige those positions would have provided.
As our brother Chandrakaut in the video you aired testified, we cannot explain how GOD did it, but we can say we lived in peace, rest and joy…even when it wasn’t overly comfortable in the flesh at times. We had obeyed GOD to remain in our tiny community and start a non-denominational house church called Joy Fellowship. During that time GOD ended our homelessness when Keith was hired to work at several part-time jobs, eventually being hired into an appointed (at-will) position as the Administrator of the Sheriff’s Office.
During that crazy time, GOD miraculously made the way for us to purchase a home on zero dollars down, at a ridiculously low price. If I remember the facts correctly, it was a 1850 sq ft brick house, on six lots, totalling nearly an acre for about $45,000 in 1996. Throughout our married life we had been tithers and generous givers in many ways beyond dollars. It was at that time that the LORD reminded us that He had led us to give away our camping trailer to a homeless family about one year earlier as a seed toward our own need BEFORE we ever knew we had a need!
A few years later, the LORD led us to give away our entire retirement fund to other ministries! Amazingly, it was not a struggle for us because we shared the conviction that it was the voice of the LORD whom we were obeying. We had confidence that where He guided, He provided.
Around a decade later, in the same community (where we still own our house and property) Keith unexpectedly lost that at-will job without notice! By this time our children were away from home, and I had gone to work managing a title company field office. For the following full year we miraculously got by on my tiny $10/hr income, until he was asked to come work in a secure position as the Accounts Payable Clerk for our county. I shake my head in wonder at how many ways GOD blessed us throughout that “skinny cow” year! You have to laugh at the irony that Keith was given a position handling money when we didn’t have any of our own.
Then, several years afterward, I lost MY job when the owner of the title company was arrested in the base city 2.5 hours away from our community for embezzlement!! It came as a complete and total shock since I never knew anything about the day-to-day operations of the company. Again, for over a year, we were hard pressed financially, but experienced miracle after miracle. At the end of that amazing time, GOD opened a job for me in (of all places) the County Treasurer’s Office handling all the money our county received! Again, I find it ironically amusing that we both were in positions of handling money…me incoming funds and Keith outgoing funds.
Long story short…as the years passed, my husband was elected to the position of County Clerk in charge of elections and public records in 2012 and for a second term in 2016 with an increase of salary. At that same time I was promoted to an appointed position as the Chief Deputy Treasurer, with a salary increase as well. We served in those positions until our retirement on January 1, 2020. Still, as public officials our accrued retirement income is very low.
We were brought from our small town in NM to TX due to my aging parents’ medical needs at the end of the first month of our retirement. We are now living in the triple blessing of GOD’s provision! We found ourselves with three of everything from cars to toasters! We’ve given away bedroom sets, tvs, clothes, on and on. As well as, we made a covenant with GOD that we would sow our Lubbock apartment rent into LIFE ministries here in town for the remaining 10 month term of our $1,600/mo lease when we moved into my parents’ home after their deaths. His part was to find us someone to take up the contract, which He did. We completed our part of the covenant this month!
We still have a storehouse of goods, houses, and lands with which we are trusting GOD. It’s all HIS, and we hold very loosely to it. He has taught us that all we have is HIS, not ours. That HE alone is our SOURCE and SUPPLY.
He, also, has taught us that while we were still younger than retirement age we should work with our own hands as a service to Him and a testimony to others. Over the years, He has thrown open doors of opportunity for each of us to speak of the goodness of GOD to others within our community outside Joy Fellowship at our workplaces, at the grocery store, in the bank, at the school…everywhere at any time!
Although we no longer work “with our hands” for a salary, we do serve in many ministry capacities.
One of our retirement passages is Psalm 71:18-19 (NKJV): “O GOD, You have taught me from my youth; and to this day I declare Your wondrous works. Now also when I am old and gray headed, O GOD, do not forsake me, until I declare Your strength to this generation, Your power to everyone who is to come.”
Just this past Passover here in Lubbock, we were invited by the owners to lead a corporate seder for a large properties development company. The opportunity arose as a case of someone, who knew someone, who knew someone, who knew that we have been celebrating Pesach since 1996 told the owners that we might be willing to do it with their employees. I shake my head in amazement at His ways!
“For [we] are unashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ for it is the power GOD unto salvation for all who believe. First to the Jew, then also to the Greek.”
Romans 1:16
By the way, let me add that although we were trusted to rightly handle the county’s money, we have never held onto much personal money, such as putting it into stocks or other savings funds, so we are inexperienced at personally managing money. Now we have inherited my parents portfolio of stocks and an IRA, money we didn’t work for, nor feel “entitled” to. We do want to handle it with the LORD’s wisdom. We understand that it is currently held within the Babylonian system, but we have continued to have it managed by their trusted financial advisor. We have zero experience with any such things!
Because of the current state of economic affairs, we don’t have the slightest expectation of it ever being of benefit to us unless we hear from GOD. We don’t actively watch the accounts, nor even know what these funds are doing. I suppose the way we are viewing the accounts for now is: If they flourish, they flourish. If they fail, they fail.
Our financial advisor has mentioned at the annual review meeting for this year that we need to add to our investments any funds from the sale of our NM properties as soon as possible, but we don’t bear witness that now is the time to sell our NM holdings. Property is selling for far below market value in our NM community and interest rates are so high that there are few buyers wanting to live in such a remote underdeveloped area. Plus, in truth, we wouldn’t want any earnings from a sale to go into our investment account within the current economic instability.
So, unless we hear differently from the LORD, we will keep travelling 12 hours one-way (with stops) from Lubbock to Reserve several times a year for a week or two to do improvements and to stay up with everything without listing our property for sale.
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