24 Hours

I had planned a day and a half to clean the house for weekend company. My sovereign Lord had other plans for me!

Yesterday afternoon, Guillermo, an electrician, came by to work on our A/C. I could not identify his rich accent.

“I am Colombian… Colombian coffee,” he replied to my question.

We talked more and I gave him a tract on the Spirit-filled life in Spanish.

This morning, Marco came to do an annual pest treatment on our home. We have talked many times over the years about spiritual things. Today, he opened up about the physical abuse he suffered as a child and how he would like to help others who are suffering.

After he left, I had shopping errands and had good conversations with Ana, Walter, Beth, and Amy. I had tracts for each of them which they were very glad to receive.

When I got home I wanted to have my daily devotional with the Lord and get going on my housework.

The doorbell rang. Our neighbor, Sharon, dropped by and I invited her in. We have talked about the Lord several times. Today was one of our best conversations. I gave her Josh McDowell’s More Than a Carpenter.

After she left, I knew I really had to get going with dusting and such, so I turned worship music on and worshiped the Lord for the incredible privilege of talking to seven people in twenty-four hours about the hope and forgiveness they can find in Jesus Christ! I am grateful that he kept my heart open and available to these sweet souls on a very busy day when I normally would want to rush from one thing to the next, trying to check things off my to-do list!

Paul on the Road to Damascus… Again

God is using the life of Paul to reach Syrians for Christ.

The premiere showing of Damascus, a film on the life of Paul, was seen by more than 1,000 influential Syrian leaders. See the trailer.

When Paul encountered Jesus, his Messiah, in Damascus, “the Lord said to Ananias, ‘Go! This man is my chosen instrument to carry my name before the Gentiles and their kings and before the people of Israel.’” (Acts 9:15)

How exciting to think that God may still be doing that through this film! Join with us in praying for God to use this film in reaching the people of the Middle East.

The Waiting Room

If you have Christian magazines, take some with you next time you are visiting a waiting room.

Your pediatrician might enjoy having Focus on the Family magazines for his waiting room or exam rooms. The magazine could be their monthly newsletter magazine or a subscription. Take a handful of Significant Woman tracts with you on your mammogram appointment for the waiting room. (Beginning Your Journey of Significance and Living a Life of Significance).

Maybe you have a Christian video for your doctor’s waiting room or flyers for your church’s next big outreach event.

Be sure to ask permission to leave materials at:
• A medical office (doctor, dentist, clinic)
• An auto mechanic’s
• A professional office
• And anywhere with a waiting room

Some other materials you might donate to a waiting room:
• Worldwide Challenge magazine
• Creation magazine
• Answers magazine
• Tracts

You might enjoy reading some more stories from my waiting room experiences.
• Well-behaved kids in a waiting room
• Taking a stand against obnoxious TV programming in waiting rooms
• Recycling
• More suggestions

A Small Act of Kindness

Mark had just helped Bill pick up the books, sweaters, and other items he had just dropped. They were walking home from school and Mark continued to walk with Bill and they ended up spending the afternoon getting to know each other. Mark continued on home.

They saw each other around school after that and went on to attend the same high school, where they saw each other occasionally.

Just before graduation, Bill reminded Mark of the day they met.

“Did you ever wonder why I was carrying so many things home that day?” he asked. “I cleaned out my locker because I didn’t want to leave a mess for anyone else. . . I was going home to commit suicide. But after we spent time together talking and laughing, it turned things around for me. You see, Mark, when you picked up those books that day, you did a lot more; you saved my life.”

This true story comes from Randy Alcorn’s In Light of Eternity, pages 121 and 122. Randy goes on to encourage his readers that God is watching and will reward us in Heaven for being faithful to Him. (To me, it would be reward enough to know that I had helped prevent a suicide!) We will probably be amazed in Heaven when we find out that some of the small things we did for others ended up helping them in a significant way.

I also highly recommend this book to clear up misconceptions people may have about what the Bible teaches about eternal life. If you aren’t excited about going to Heaven, this little book is for you! You may even find you will be more eager to share your faith with others so they can enjoy eternity with God, too!

When God Will Judge

Two men owned farms side by side. One was a bitter atheist, the other a devout Christian. Constantly annoyed at the Christian for his trust in God, the atheist said to him one winter, “Let’s plant our crops as usual this spring, each the same number of acres. You pray to your God and I’ll curse him. Then come October, let’s just see who has the bigger crop.”

When October came, the atheist was delighted because his crop was larger. “See, you fool,” he taunted. “What do you have to say for your God now?”

“My God,” replied the other farmer, “doesn’t settle all his accounts in October.”

God’s compensation for both believers and unbelievers is usually deferred. But a day is coming upon all men, when the announcement from heaven will ring out, “The time has come for judging … and for rewarding” (Revelation 11:18). This will be the “appointed time” of judgment (l Corinthians 4:5). “At the proper time,” Paul says elsewhere, “we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” So he encourages us, “Let us not become weary in doing good” (Galatians 6:9).

From In Light of Eternity by Randy Alcorn, page 129

The Dinner Plans

“Whenever you give to someone who is helpless or needy, you are serving Jesus and, in turn the Father. In addition, I can tell you from personal experience that serving those who can’t repay you brings the deepest satisfaction.

“Several years ago, Vonette and I were about to celebrate our wedding anniversary. I was trying to think of a special, elegant place to take her that would express how important she is to me. I wanted it to be a meaningful evening.

“But . . . after discussing the plans with Vonette, we agreed that instead of going to an elegant hotel . . . we would serve meals to the homeless. We knew a friend who ran a kitchen for the homeless, so he arranged for us to go.

“Soon after we arrived, we were given our assigned places in the serving line, and people began walking by cafeteria -style. Right away I noticed that these people carried an air of defeat. No on e looked me in the eye. I found myself identifying with them. I thought, But for the grace of God, what happened to them could happen to me, and I began to weep.

“I served for an entire hour with tears streaming down my cheeks. I thought about the compassion Jesus had for people as He ministered to them. I recalled . . . Matthew9:36: ‘[Jesus] felt great pity for the crowds that came, because their problems were so great and they didn’t know where to go for help.’ The experience . . . gave me a deeper compassion for people who are less fortunate than I am. “

–[Excerpt from Discover the Real Jesus by Bill Bright, pp. 107 -108]

The Walkie-Talkies

I kept looking toward the roller coasters, nervously tapping my foot. I had waited more than a half an hour, instead of enjoying the theme park. I needed to meet up with the rest of the family, but time crawled as I fidgeted on the bench. It was only natural that I asked for walkie-talkies that next Christmas.

For several years after that, the walkie-talkies were a great help on a lot of our vacation trips. Now in 2007, we use our cell phones when we need to connect, but actually our kids really don’t want us to split up anymore. They want us to spend the day together when we go to a park.

The walkie-talkies waited silently in a drawer for two years until last month when I came across them and knew it was time to find a new home for them. They were still in good condition and worth a little bit. However, I don’t do yard sales anymore, so I did not even think about selling them. Instead, I started thinking about who might use some walkie-talkies.

I tried our church because our campus is getting more spread out, but they already have some. I was getting a little tired of the time and effort of looking for new owners when I thought of friends of ours who were expecting their fifth child. This little princess is due soon and will find herself in a homeschool family with four active brothers, ages four to fifteen.

I sent an e-mail off to Jo. She was thrilled and so was I. Now she can stay inside when she needs to rest or watch little ones and know she can easily reach her active boys. The boys will have a lot of fun with the walkie-talkies, too.

Of course, I could have just donated these to a charity. It would have been easier, but it is a lot more fun and rewarding to find a need and help to meet it.

The Eternal Value of Seven Dollars

The early morning air was still cool, just right for a walk… before the scorching Florida sun would discourage me from venturing out later. No one else was out when I spotted three folded green bills lying near the sidewalk.

Picking up a soggy seven dollars, I wondered if someone had lost them the night before. I noticed I was exactly halfway between two houses. Did one of these people lose the money or was it someone last night or that morning out for a jog or a walk? It was too early to knock on their doors, so I wrote a letter to both houses asking if they were missing any money.

Five days later, I went to our bank’s ATM. I was thinking about the seven dollars and decided God must mean for me to give it to a Faith Promise at church. Right at that moment, I found five dollars lying on the ground there, too! The tellers inside the bank told me to keep the money. I thought this must be additional money for our Faith Promise, not knowing God was about to show me the eternal value of this money I was finding.

Just ten minutes later, I just stepped in the house when the phone rang from the person missing the seven dollars. I drove straight over to her house. Rosanna was waiting for me outside. Her Roman nose and straight black hair said “Peruvian” long before she told me were she was from originally. She was amazed that I would make a point of getting the money back to her, which of course, allowed me to share about the Lord. We talked further and she told me about her problems with her adult children.

I learned she was moving in three days, so it became obvious to me I needed to share the Gospel with her right then. She invited me into her house where I went through “Would You Like to Know God Personally.” As I started to explain about sin and our separation from God, Rosanna began crying quietly. She was very eager to have Christ in her heart, so she prayed silently to herself to ask Him in.

The next day, I checked around with friends and then gave Rosanna’s phone number to a woman who lives near Rosanna’s new apartment. Susanna sounded like a “perfect match” so I prayed that Rosanna would grow in her new faith and would be willing to go to church with Susanna.

I am so glad I did not view the seven dollars as a windfall or even as something to give to the church. I always make an effort to return lost money to its owner. Of course, it was an even greater thrill to see God use this little event to make an eternal difference and bring a lost soul to Himself.

An Eternal Investment

A young man waited at our door with a container of items at his feet. We have made it a policy not to support things we don’t know about, so I said “no” and then gave him a tract.

I really wasn’t surprised later that day to see the tract tossed aside on my neighbor’s sidewalk. I did not “invest” in this young salesman to “gain a hearing” for the Gospel. Just spending time talking to him would have shown I really was interested in him. Would spending a few minutes or a few dollars have brought an eternal return?

Fast forward several years to last month when I was given a bag of more groceries than I could use. I knew what to do and gave most of them to my neighbor across the street.

“I’ll make soup!” Cathy beamed as she examined the large bag. “My boys will love snacking on the carrots, too.”

A few weeks later, as I was spring cleaning, I brought her a box overflowing with toys that my boys had enjoyed when they were younger. Cathy’s boys, on tiptoe, tried to peer into the box as I handed it over to her.

Last week, a friend and I sat around Cathy’s dining room table to take a worldview survey with her. Suddenly tears filled Cathy’s eyes.

“Last night was very hard,” she explained.

We listened and we prayed and we hugged her. Then, we shared how she could know God personally. Cathy prayed to receive Christ with us! Her tear-stained face was radiant when we left her.

The groceries would have spoiled in my fridge. The toys would have put a few dollars in my wallet or rusted in the garage. How much better to use what Jesus gives to me as a tool to unlock a heart for God!

SIDE NOTE: Many years ago I gave up on the small return of yard sales and switched to the eternal investment of blessing someone. I could write volumes on what I’ve learned about giving things away.

True Riches

I was reading in Light of Eternity by Randy Alcorn. He was discussing the parable of the unjust steward in Luke 16: 1 – 13. I was particularly impressed by his thought of “true riches.”

God reminds us repeatedly in His Word that He owns everything and we are stewards of what He gives us. It can be challenging to live that way and keep that mindset.

In this life, God desires for us to be faithful stewards of our lives: the time, the talents, treasures, opportunities,… that He has given us. If we are faithful with what is His, then He promises us “true riches” in eternity.

One meaning of true riches is that only in Heaven do I have ownership. For the first time, God will give me what I can call “my own.”

Also, true riches are only possible in Heaven where no one can be impoverished by my gain. No one is needy in eternity.

This also raises the thought for me this morning. Is someone missing out because I will not loosen my grip on something that isn’t really mine in the first place?