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| Heather and Janelle--a ministry friendship forged in crazy times! |
In the summer of 2002, I was walking with a spiritual limp. I had just experienced some deep hurt and humiliation. I had learned the hard way that ministry organizations often really care more about numbers than about integrity. My spirit had been wounded deeply by some fellow missionaries. The organization just glossed over it all. To be honest, the experience nearly destroyed me. My soul hurt so much I was in physical pain much of the time. I woke up every morning with an ache in my chest. Any time I was alone, I was crying. I daily asked God to take me home to Heaven before the day was over. Suicidal thoughts consumed me. One day in particular, I was pumping gasoline into my car, and I was struck with the temptation to drink gas myself and end it all. I was horrified that it had really come to that. Not even sure what I still had to live for, I got back in the car fast and drove off (I had paid at the pump with a card already). I literally had to have Christian music playing 24/7 in order for the pain to be even remotely tolerable. I could understand why David's playing soothed King Saul. Godly music does that. Prayer was my lifeline to sanity. It was a time where it was just God and me. I felt I had no one to turn to. No one wanted to hear about what I was going through. The one or two people I tried to talk to told me to "snap out of it". I was in a very dark place. It felt like nothing good could ever come from that.
And in the middle of all of this, I still kept getting up and doing ministry every day. I trusted no one. But I still kept doing what I had been doing, One thing I did was go to a small Baptist Church in Riverside, California and do a ministry presentation. My heart wasn't really in it, but it was a duty I needed to do. This particular presentation was to promote our high school summer missionary program. So, that Sunday, I went to the little church and spoke about this ministry. I honestly can't remember a word I said. I passed around a clipboard and asked the teens who were interested in being summer missionaries to write their names and phone numbers. At the end of the service, I retrieved my clipboard from the back of the sanctuary. Three names had been written. One was the name Heather Dowding.
Heather was a sixteen-year-old girl in the congregation. She had been a part of that particular church family for years. I ended up speaking with her, and was struck by her friendliness and enthusiasm. I asked Heather her testimony.
"Well," She began, "My mom and I were out driving at night, and we were in a bad area. The car stalled, and we were really scared. We prayed to God and asked Him to help us, and as soon as we did, the car started. We wanted to start following God, so we came to this church the next Sunday, and we've come ever since. We learned about the Lord, and we got baptized here,"
It sounded good to me. Heather ended up becoming one of our summer missionary evangelists. I had to admit that getting into summer ministry was helping keep me busy and helping me feel a little bit less alone.
The summer missionary program was very evangelistic. Teens learned to share their faith. I had attended as a high schooler, and was now a leader. I saw Heather and the others enjoy themselves, but I also saw a lot of intense spiritual battles. I didn't know why. I also started experiencing some backlash from my earlier struggles and betrayal in ministry. Some very vicious rumors started circulating about me on email, and I had to change my email address (I'm just thankful this was before Facebook existed!). I was plunged deeper than ever into darkness. Those who had hurt me the most were being honored by the ministry, and that was hard. Why was all this happening?
Toward the end of training, Heather had a profound experience. She was teaching a group of children. As she explained the gospel, she burst into tears, describing what Jesus had done for us by dying on the cross. She gave the most heartfelt gospel message you can imagine, and several children prayed to receive Christ. It was wonderful.
Heather spent the rest of the summer helping me do Bible clubs all over Riverside County. At the end of it, she confided, "You know, I always thought I was a Christian, but I realized that I didn't really understand the gospel until this summer. That day when I was crying at the Bible club, it was because I was realizing for the first time what Jesus had really done for me, and I received Christ with the kids that day."
Wow! Heather had fallen through the cracks. Her Bible-teaching church had thought she understood the gospel. I had thought she understood. But that summer, the Spirit brought that truth to her! God was really at work. No wonder Satan was attacking so fiercely.
Two summers later, in 2004, I was doing much better (in that I was no longer suicidal), but I still had yet to experience true healing. A few more residual things from that earlier hurtful experience occurred in '04, as well as new battles. It was a hard summer in several ways.
Heather was on her third year as a summer missionary. One night that summer (which was actually on the hardest day of that summer for me), Heather and I had a chat. Now eighteen, she said she was discouraged, because she didn't know what God had in store for her. I listened. I can't recall I said anything profound, but I asked her where she wanted to see her life a year in the future. She told me she wanted to see herself on the mission field. I told her to go for it. I don't recall what else specifically I said. Anyway, as a result of that conversation, Heather ended up going full time into the ministry! She attended ministry institute. She ended up serving for a few years with our ministry on the East Coast, and is now married, serving full time with her husband in the Philippines.
Also in 2004, I was discipling a friend, a new Christian about my age. This young woman had some baggage. I don't really know how I knew what to say or do, or even if I did or said the right things. I know I failed at times. Mostly, I had a wonderful time with this friend. We spent most of 2004 (January through December) studying our Bibles together, reading Christian books, doing ministry together, and having fun (like going camping, bowling, to the movies, or out for ice cream, etc.) The year ended, though, with her making some decisions that ended our time of discipleship and even friendship. Some of it was because my reaction wasn't the best. It was hard, and I felt like I had blown it and failed this friend. I also wondered if I had wasted my time.
Years later, this girl, her husband (she was now married), and her two children began attending my church in California. They began coming weekly, getting involved. In a short time, we were able to pick back up where we had left off. This friend told me, "When we used to hang out in 2004, that was the best year of my whole life." Wow, God had used a year when I was struggling myself, and even made mistakes in my discipleship, to plant seeds in this friend that would later bring her whole family to our church and into service there. So much fruit came out of the hardest times of my life. The times when I could barely carry on. The times when I felt like my heart was breaking inside of me, and it took everything I had inside to keep going. God is the One who did this, not me. I take no credit. I just stand amazed that our God can redeem anything!
First Thessalonians 5:24 says, "Faithful is Him that calleth you, who also will do it." I definitely experienced that. I certainly wasn't at my best in the early 2000's when these experiences happened. But God was faithful, and He did it! He produced great fruit.
One of the passages that kept me going back when things were really dark, especially in 2002, was Second Corinthians 4:8-9, in the Living Bible. "We are pressed on every side by troubles, but not crushed and broken. We are perplexed because we don't know why things happen as they do, but we don't give up and quit. We are hunted down, but God never abandons us. We get knocked down, but we get up and keep going."
Now, in retrospect, I am encouraged when I think about different times of ministry in my life, including these hard times. God was always producing fruit. Second Corinthians 6:3-10 (also in the Living Bible) really speaks about the different conditions of our lives and hearts at different points in ministry. I will close with this challenging passage:
"We try to live in such a way that no one will ever be offended or kept back from finding the Lord by the way we act, so that no one can find fault with us and blame it on the Lord. In fact, in everything we do we try to show that we are true ministers of God. We patiently endure suffering and hardship and trouble of every kind. We have been beaten, put in jail, faced angry mobs, worked to exhaustion, stayed awake through sleepless nights of watching, and gone without food. We have proved ourselves to be what we claim by our wholesome lives and by our understanding of the Gospel and by our patience. We have been kind and truly loving and filled with the Holy Spirit. We have been truthful, with God's power helping us in all we do. All of the godly man's arsenal--weapons of defense, and weapons of attack--have been ours. We stand true to the Lord whether others honor us or despise us, whether they criticize us or commend us. We are honest, but they call us liars. The world ignores us, but we are known to God; we lie close to death, but here we are, still very much alive. We have been injured but kept from death. Our hearts ache, but at the same time we have the joy of the Lord. We are poor, but we give rich spiritual gifts to others. We own nothing, and yet we enjoy everything."
