My First Love

“2 I know your works, your labor, and your endurance, and that you cannot tolerate evil. You have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not, and you have found them to be liars. 3 You also possess endurance and have tolerated many things because of My name and have not grown weary. 4 But I have this against you: You have abandoned the love you had at first.” Revelations 2:2-4

My greatest fear in the ministry is that my heart will grow cold towards the things of God or I will become bitter and distance myself from the people of God. Recently Chad was talking to a man who had served in the ministry for a long time and had just become weary of sharing his faith. It is especially hard when working in difficult areas where we fight against so many spiritual strongholds. Sometimes I feel like The Gospel gets trampled by those marching in line to their destruction.

Last night the girls at church were really struggling, and speaking honestly about where they are in their walk with God. One girl said she is just living in doubt, another admits she is enjoying the sin in her life too much to live for God. “I don’t see the treasure you keep talking about.” She admitted. The things of God have no value to her right now.

Once again, I came home with a pretty heavy heart. While falling asleep, the only way I could let go of the burden was to pray, “God, I believe you sent Your Son Jesus so we could have peace with you. Please give me the strength to share this peace I have found. Give them the faith to accept this peace.” 

This morning we were back in the usual routine of getting ready for school. Rooms were clean, at least picked up, kids were dressed and I sat down to try and catch the weather amidst the usual sounds of morning chaos. Ruby came to sit in my lap and said, “I have a secret. No boys can hear it!” Then she whispered in my ear so that Sean couldn’t hear, “I want to pray to God with you. Let’s go.”

I turned off the TV and stayed right where I was, but she stood up and said, “Let’s go in your room to pray, and get your Bible because I’m going to teach you something about Jesus.” I was laughing to myself thinking how silly and sweet it was for Ruby to want to teach me about Jesus; then I looked down at her tiny hand leading me into God’s presence. God spoke to my heart right then, “This is how you come to me, this is how you accept My Word, this is how you enter my Kingdom. Like this little child.”

As we walked past the office I grabbed my pink Precious Moments Bible off the shelf. It’s the one my dad bought me when I turned 11 years old.  I opened it to show Ruby where I had written the date of my baptism and the date God had called me to be a missionary. She wasn’t very interested, but took the Bible from me and opened it up to Deuteronomy. After struggling to pronounce, “Dood-nor-mon-nomy” she moved on instead to the lesson from her heart. “Jesus is our father in Heaven.” She said, “He wants us to obey Him. He died for us.” I thanked her for sharing that Bible lesson. We prayed together, she thanked God for healing all the people and for all the churches around the world.

It is true that living under the constant influence of this world can leave a heart cold. It’s true that a spirit can grow battle weary and bitter. This is why throughout God’s Word we see a call to forsake the things of this world and pursue His presence. After the kids left for school, instead of whipping out my list of things I needed to catch up on, I stopped and thanked Jesus for using the tender heart of my daughter to lead me back to my first love. I pray my life won’t be a string of dead works, and instead bear good fruit as a result of a real and growing relationship with Jesus.

Do you remember your first love?

Battle Ready

"Y'all need to pray for me tonight 'cause I've got a big attitude!" This was the first prayer request of the night during Youth Bible Study three weeks ago on Sunday. Around the rest of the room we went to the 16- year- old mom with her baby in her lap who asked for prayer as she is grieving the loss of her aunt who was found face down in the driveway over the weekend. Then to the last young girl with her hand up who asked for prayer for her "whole life".

There were visitors, two girls who came to Wednesday night Bible study the week before. They didn't have any prayer requests but they wanted to know why the Bibles I handed out weren't the King James Version. It seemed unusual that these two young girls would be so concerned with what version of the Bible we were reading from, but I didn't pay too much attention to them. My heart was still heavy from the prayer request time and I was ready to take the requests to the Lord.

After we prayed, I assigned each girl a verse to look up in the Bible. They would each read their verse out loud as we walked through the lesson together. The two new girls said they didn't want to read a verse. "It's okay. You don't have to." I said. As soon as we started the lesson they began to ask questions about Jacob and Esau. They had looked up a list of names of tribes in the Bible and wanted me to explain why those tribes were considered enemies of God's people.

I gave short answers to their questions and promised the girls that we could do a more in-depth study together another time, since my lesson really didn't have to do with retracing the lineage of the Hittites. As I moved on and tried to get back on track one of the girls began mocking me and whispered to her friend, "She just doesn't want to say the truth!"

The girls continued to interrupt until finally I realized where they were coming from and the real reason why they were coming to Bible Study. They are members of the Hebrew Israelite cult and as far as they're concerned, as a white woman, I have no business teaching the Bible. They believe that only African Americans and other minorities are the chosen people of God. They were trying to make me see how "ignorant" I was to think that I could be a child of God without being born into their race or tribe. They continued to mock me, whisper and disrupt the time until finally, I just stopped.

I was 18 years old when I was put in charge of teaching my first class of inner city children. As the kids came through the door I knelt down and asked each one of them for their names to make their nametag. When the third little boy came through the door, I knelt down and asked his name. In response, he bit my thumb so hard that he drew blood. I dropped the marker and began to cry.

Seventeen years later and I don't remember being brought to tears while teaching a class since the "thumb-biting" incident; however, these girls managed to do it. The other girls in the group were desperately trying to pay attention. The weekly times of Bible study are a life- line for them and they didn't want our time to be wasted. The new girls refused to leave, insisting that they were there to learn. So, with my Bible open to the text I had prepared to teach on, I just began reading it aloud; then prayed and dismissed the group. On their way out the door the girls told me again how blind I was to the truth; then they left, and I stood by the door bewildered at all that had just happened. 

Sometimes I forget that there is a very real battle going on. The battle is not with these two teenage girls, rather an evil spirit who desires to overcome the love of Jesus with hate. This is why Paul tells us in Ephesians to be strengthened by the Lord and His vast strength. If we are going to be victorious over the sin and darkness in this world we are going to need the great strength of the Lord.

This week Russia has threatened to march in and take over the Ukrainian government. The whole world is watching in protest. "You can't do that!" we say. But they are doing it! They are parking their ships in Crimea and launching tanks full of battle ready soldiers. The Ukrainian government is not prepared for the battle and if no one comes to their defense they are destined to be overtaken by Russia. The picture in the news this week that said it all for me was of the fleet of broken down Ukrainian tanks, sunk into the sand and covered in moss.

That night, these girls had brought the battle to my front door and caught me unprepared.  What broke my heart was that part of me was just going through the motions of our Sunday night business. I hadn't spent time in prayer for the youth who might be coming to hear The Word, I hadn't asked God to speak through me. It is so easy to become comfortable and miss out on the victories that only come when we are humble before God, relying on His power to do the work that only He can do. The greatest weapons, at my disposal, of prayer and spiritual readiness were sunk in the distractions of my mind and bogged down by my self-reliance. Jesus, our commander, stands ready to engage His enemy today and everyday.  

Revelation 17:14 says, "These will make war against the Lamb, but the Lamb will conquer them because He is Lord of lords and King of kings. Those with Him are called and elect and faithful."

Those of us who are in Christ are never defenseless. We are called to be faithful, His chosen servants. Chosen to carry out His work here on earth. The enemy is also at work, deceiving entire generations. Offering counterfeit and perverted versions of the blessed life that only comes through knowing Christ. By God's grace we will be riding with our victorious King on the day when Satan is conquered for all eternity.

As for today and until the Lord's return, we must do as Paul instructs in Ephesians 6:13, "This is why you must take up the full armor of God so that you may be able to resist in the evil day, and having prepared everything, to take your stand."

Tonight is Bible Study night again. I hope those girls come back. I've been praying for them for three weeks that God would prepare me through His Spirit to speak the truth to them, and that they may be able to comprehend the Light of His Salvation.

Please pray with us at Truth that we will continue to have the boldness to carry out the work and that lives will be eternally changed.

A CASE FOR LIVING BY FAITH

Yesterday didn’t go as planned. I was supposed to speak at a luncheon in Del City, but it was rescheduled due to the winter weather. I’d been really looking forward to the time and felt kind of low for the rest of the day.

I love to share about all God is doing. I told somebody the other day that if I don’t get those opportunities to share I feel like I might explode! I think I may have scared the poor woman because she took a step back. What I meant was, that everyday Chad and I feel like we have front row seats to watch as God unfolds his plan for our lives and the life of the ministry at Truth.

We are amazed by God, but also have our share of disappointments. The best way I know to deal with the hard times is to remember the faithfulness of God. Writing and speaking is a great outlet for that. So yesterday, instead, I worked at home, kept to myself and started to throw a little “pity party”.  Until . . . Jesus invited Himself to my party of one.

Never forget that we have a Savior who loves us and out of His perfect love pursues us. Yesterday, He started guiding me through all of my time with Him, reminding me of who I am in Him. His Word encouraged me to continue to walk in faith by reminding me of the great plans He holds for our life.

So here is the sermon I preached to myself . . . it is a case for living by faith.

THE GREATNESS OF GOD COMPELS ME TO LIVE BY FAITH

I still get excited when I read Genesis 1:2 “The earth was without form and void. And the Spirit of God hovered over the deep.” WOW! I just want to be in that moment where it’s all about to go down and the Spirit of God is hovering over the vast formless void. That suspenseful moment before he speaks light into the darkness, fixes the moon and stars into the sky, rends the firmament and constrains the oceans. All of the world we continue to attempt to discover and understand, He created from nothing.

Whenever our lives get down to nothing, I just picture the Spirit of God in the midst of that nothing. Think of the endless possibilities when God puts His power behind our nothing! I truly believe God can do anything, and I don’t want to miss out on being a part of His grand plan because of fear or doubt.

Again, in Luke 1:35 the angel was explaining to an ordinary young girl named Mary how it would be possible that she would give birth to the son of God. “The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of The Most High will overshadow you. So the baby born to you will be holy, and he will be called the Son of God.”

There truly is no end to what God can do which leads me to my next point,

TO LIVE BY FAITH I MUST LET GO OF MY WEAKNESSES AND PRIDE

It is true that God can do anything, but God’s plan and purposes are higher than my own. What God has called me to do is much greater than my own abilities and resources. It would actually not take me very long to rise to my own incompetence, drop one level lower then live out my life in complacency.

On the other hand, my pride warns me all along the way of the possibility of failure and embarrassment. “Think of what they might say . . ." says pride. What if I step out in faith and fall flat on my face? What if walking by faith causes me to be misunderstood, counted out or even shunned! What would that do to my ego?!?

The correct response to self-doubt and pride is to truly humble myself before God. True humility takes my eyes off of self and directs my focus to the person and work of Jesus Christ.

God calls us to big things! In our culture today it is a huge challenge just to set Christ-like examples for our children, lead with integrity in our workplace and treat others with respect. Of course we will lose heart! Failure and disappointment will cause us to want to give up, but the disturbing truth is we never stop worshipping. It is our human nature to idolize and strive. The enemy knows this. He would love for us to lower our standards, turn away and waste our attention, adoration and affections on the things of this world. He knows these things are passing away. At best, we will end up wasting our lives, at worst the worldly things we choose will never satisfy and ultimately they will destroy us.

Hebrews 3:12-13 warns us, “See to it, brothers and sisters, that none of you has a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it is called “Today,” so that none of you may be hardened by sin’s deceitfulness.”

Jesus promises us throughout His Word that if we will humble ourselves He will lift us up. If we seek His Kingdom first He will provide. If we lose our life in Him He will give us a life of meaning and purpose that we would never have dreamed possible. A life that is not possible, outside of Christ.

Obedience follows humility. Unshakeable faith comes through humilty. As the Hymn says, “Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus, just to take Him at His word. Just to rest upon His promise, Just to know thus sayeth the Lord.”  

I challenge you to humble yourself before Jesus, take Him at His word and follow Him into the lost world around you.

I LIVE BY FAITH BECAUSE THE LOSTNESS OF OUR WORLD CONFRONTS ME DAILY

Thursday nights are kid’s nights at Truth. It’s also “Daddy night” at home because Chad stays home with our kids. It’s become a habit that when I walk in Chad just automatically turns off the T.V. or stops what he’s doing to listen. Even though I’ve only spent a couple of hours with the kids in our ministry, I have to process the things they say. The things they say give me a glimpse into what is going on in their lives and what’s going on in their lives breaks my heart.

It’s not just in poverty areas either. Our city, our world needs Jesus! So much ground has been lost to the enemy, so many families and lives of children influenced and destroyed by sin. At times it just seems hopeless!

It is not hopeless! If you know Christ, if you are a follower of Christ, if you are living by faith then you are a dangerous weapon against darkness! Jesus calls us to be salt and light. We always assume that our lost friends, neighbors, co-workers don’t want to hear us witness to them. Guess what? That’s true! They want to know why you have patience with difficult people, how you have joy when things aren’t going your way. Living by faith will produce genuine fruit in your life and the power of Christ at work in you will become your testimony.

When Chad and I were living in the apartment complex I spent just about every evening sitting on the steps in breeze ways, counseling with young mom and sharing Bible stories with kids while they played with David, Sean and Ruby. If you were judging by our circumstances, there wasn’t much difference financially. I didn’t have anything of any material value to offer. What I had to share was the hope of Jesus Christ. I had and still have the hope that His Holy Spirit is at work in my life making me new, giving me boldness, power, strength and joy. I pray that through living by faith He will give me the endurance to run the race He has laid out for me as a wife, mother, missionary, daughter and friend.

“So, you see, without faith it is impossible to please God. 

 Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that there is a God 

and that He rewards those who sincerely seek Him.”

Hebrews 11:6 NLT

A Legacy of Faith

The sermon was emphasizing international missions, the music was worshipful and uplifting; still three weeks ago as I sat in church, an unexplainable wave of emotion came over me. The speaker kind of reminded me of the way my father used to preach. He mentioned that his wife had battled cancer. Anytime I hear someone characterize their experience with disease as a battle, I think of the pain my father endured for years on a daily basis. As soon as I started thinking about Dad, it was like the enemy leaned over my shoulder and whispered, “God could’ve answered your prayers and healed your dad, but He didn’t.”

Right there in church the tears began to flow. I can’t think of anything in my life I spent more time praying for than for my father to be healed. I was just fifteen when he was first diagnosed with liver failure. He was successfully transplanted my senior year in High school. We looked at every day he lived after his transplant as a gift.

He lived to see his grandchildren, celebrated graduations, preached weddings and even baptized one of his grandsons. The summer after I graduated from college he took mom and me to the mountains nearly every weekend so we could see the town and he could conquer impossible mountain trails in his International Scout.

Dad cherished the second chance at life he’d been given and went right back to the work God had called him to do as a young man, the work of faithfully preaching the Gospel. Just a few months after his transplant the Doctors released him to go home. Dad and Mom came back to our home in Amarillo, Texas. With a new passion to serve, Dad went to visit the neighborhood he grew up in as a child and found children still living in physical and spiritual poverty. To him this looked like a great location to plant a church!

That same year our family started a church in downtown Amarillo where Dad began preaching again. His desire to serve so faithfully inspired many others to give their lives to preach the Gospel. For years he drove a lunch route in his old neighborhood telling the children who lived at his old address about Jesus and invited their families to church.

While he had a new liver, the disease that had destroyed his old liver was still in his blood. There would be days when he felt great and days when he was so weak he couldn’t get out of bed. The medication he took to fight the disease was a monthly injection that would bring on severe flu like symptoms.

Even though he battled illness, Dad used his testimony of faith to point others to Christ. He made the most of the good days and still pressed forward on the bad days. Many times he would say that God has been able to use him more in times of weakness than in times of great strength.

Yes, I prayed that God would heal my father. Every day. Still, four years ago this month, he passed away. Is it true that God ignored my prayers? Did God turn a deaf ear and a cold shoulder to my request? Was my faith not strong enough for God to release His healing power?  That Sunday, despite all the attempts to fight the lie with the Truth, I was left with a heavy heart.

This morning Chad left the house early. It was quiet and I couldn’t go back to sleep so I opened my Bible. There in John chapter 11 I found Martha saying to Jesus, “Jesus if you had been here, my brother would not have died. But even now I know that God will give you whatever you ask.”

It brought me great comfort to see how Jesus responded to Martha. Jesus knew Martha did not have the same understanding He had of eternal matters. Through her grief she could not see how Jesus would use the death of her brother to bring glory to His name. Still, Jesus wanted her to understand! He wanted the faith of Mary and Martha and everyone else who was witness to the death and resurrection of Lazarus to be strengthened. Jesus comforted these sisters, showed compassion and shared in their loss; then He brought the victory!

In my father’s case, there was no instant healing, but through brokenness he lived a life of eternal significance. He believed and taught that there is more to life than what we experience here on earth.

When we trust Jesus with our life, we are trusting that while we may suffer and though we may not understand our circumstances, God can use our lives to bring glory to His name. So nothing, not even death, can destroy us when we are in Christ.

This is my response to the lie. Yes, God had the power to answer any one of my prayers and heal my father. No, there was no instant healing. Instead God did something much greater. He used the life of Don Lane to spread the hope of the Gospel so that many could be saved alive and his legacy of faith goes lives on in my life.

The night of my father’s funeral, after a full day of preaching, worship and talk of Heaven our oldest son David started asking questions about Salvation. Chad and I talked with him for a while then sent him to bed. A little while later, David came into the living room to tell us God had been talking to his heart and he prayed to accept Jesus.  We prayed with him again and thanked the Lord for the hope we have in Jesus. The next Sunday David was baptized.

I am so thankful that even in the face of death we were able to tell David about how he can trust Jesus and have eternal life. We will continue to teach our children and strive to follow the example set by generations of true Christ followers before us, that nothing we face in this life can separate us from the love of our faithful God.

Jesus told her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die like everyone else, will live again. They are given eternal life for believing in me and will never perish. Do you believe this, Martha?” John 11:25

I do believe! Thank you Jesus for this great HOPE! 

The Thousand Hills Cattle Company

It was September 2005 and our country was struggling to respond to the devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Chad and I were living and serving in downtown Amarillo, Texas at the time and had just received word that our city would be a major hub for refugees from Louisiana.

As is typical in disaster situations, everyone was on stand by and no one was sure how many refugees would be coming. In preparation for response, the city began calling on the resources of local churches and relief organizations. At the time, one of my jobs was managing the kitchen. We were used to feeding lots of people and had a pantry that never went empty.

The Mayor held a meeting to coordinate resources, and it was determined that Citychurch would be providing the meals over the next few weeks as traffic came and went from the staging area at the Amarillo Civic Center. This meant we would be feeding local emergency workers and volunteers as well as children and their families who would have made the long bus trip after facing such a crisis.

When we had the staff meeting to plan for these meals, we didn’t really have a lot of information to go on. The number of people who would be landing in Amarillo kept fluctuating from 300 to 3000. Basically, the plan was to start buying food, cooking it and catering it over to the Civic Center. We would also be feeding people around-the -clock as the buses would arrive.

After we discussed the amount of food the church had on hand and the amount of food we would need to purchase, my dad looked at the numbers and said, “Well, we know who owns the cattle on a thousand hills. We’ll trust him to provide.” With that, we prayed to God for provision and everyone went to work.

I gathered up my shopping list and headed out the door for Sam’s. As I walked down the sidewalk to my car, I saw a man standing on the curb looking up at the church sign. He seemed a little confused, so I stopped to ask if I could help him. He explained that he was a pastor and his church wanted to help with all the relief efforts in Amarillo. “One of my members came to me and said he has a bunch of ground beef they want to donate to you guys since you’re providing meals.” When he told me that I laughed and explained, “I’m sorry, I’m laughing because we were just talking about how much food we would need and my dad said he’s not worried about it because he knows who owns the cattle on a thousand hills.” The pastor got a real stunned look on his face, and I was really afraid I’d offended him. Then he opened his wallet and pulled out the business card of the man with the ground beef. My voice started shaking as I read the name on the business card aloud, “The Thousand Hills Cattle Company!”

The pastor and I laughed and praised The Lord right there on the sidewalk as both our hearts were stirred to see the hand of God moving to provide for this unexpected need. He later invited me to come share this story with his congregation so that their faith might be strengthened as well.

I’m convinced that God uses our weakness and our needs to draw us closer. When we learn to trust and we finally lay all we don’t have on the altar, it’s like He says, “Now, watch what I can do!” Boldness to move forward in obedience comes when we have experienced His glorious faithfulness firsthand.

What are you trusting God for today? Whatever the need, the Heavenly Father is big enough to provide. 

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him and He shall direct your paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6