God's Promptings

How many times have we sensed the Holy Spirit prompting up to pursue someone and we simply had good intentions to follow up, but let it fall through the cracks?

I know it has happened to me before. Why? Maybe a lack of what to do or say or how to approach them.

The Lord normally doesn't put people on our hearts for no reason, but desires us to pray and seek a way(s) to reach out and pursue them.

This scenario happened yesterday to Joey when, during his quiet time, the Lord put a particular individual on his heart that he went to youth group with. This guy had definitely gotten off on the wrong path and wasn't walking with the Lord. He had been in prison for multiple DWI's. Joey told me about the prompting and I told him I would pray and ask the Lord to show him something specific that he needed to do. So, yesterday during his lunch break he tracked this guy down (he knew where he worked) and showed up and invited him to lunch. They went to Dairy Queen and over lunch this guy shared his heart with Joey and what had been going on with him and what God had been doing in his life. He is back in church and going to AA. Joey tried to encourage him and listen to him share his struggles/victories. He doesn't know why God led him to do it or why He prompted him to pursue this guy, but he didn't want to let it go. The guy gave Joey all of his numbers where he could be reached and invited him to go fishing with him sometime.

Joey may never know why, but only God knows what fruit will become of their meeting. Maybe the guy just needed a bit of encouragement; someone to show they cared; someone to reach out the love of Christ to him when the world has turned its back on him.

If the Lord puts someone on your heart, don't neglect the prompting. Pray and ask Him to show you a very specific way that you need to reach out. Could be a card of encouragement, a phone call, a lunch date, a gift of some sort, intercessory prayer on their behalf or something else specific. This person could be a believer or not one at all. The logistics in how you minister might be different if they know the Lord, but the point is don't ignore the Holy Spirit. Don't let shyness, pride, or busyness get in the way of ministering to someone. Tell them the Lord laid them on your heart and what the Lord showed you to do. You will be blessed and I guarantee will come away more encouraged than the recipient.

Fundraising Gala 2009

Last night was the Pregnancy Resource Center's 2nd annual fundraising Gala. The community room was packed out with 140 people in attendance which was all that room would hold comfortably. I don't believe I saw an empty seat at any of the tables. I began to pray yesterday when I woke up and saw the drizzle, the cloudiness, and the chilly weather. I asked the Lord to give us pretty weather this year for the Gala with sunshine and warmth and do you know He did what I specifically prayed? Thank you Lord for answering prayer. Seeing as we got iced out last year, we didn't want a repeat again this year.

The speaker was Carol Everett, a nationally known pro-life speaker and author. She has been on both sides of the industry and has an awesome testimony of God's forgiveness, restoration, and healing. She did a most fantastic job and I think you could have heard a pin drop on several occasions. Stacy and Anita, mom and daughter, shared their personal testimonies. Both of their stories was powerful and heart wrenching as they both testified to the amazing power of God's love and healing through an abortion and an unplanned pregnancy. What a sweet time to see mother and daughter for the first time get to share together God's work in their lives.

This work is an important work, a kingdom changing work, and Joey and I are blessed to be a part of it. You get to change lives one at a time and hopefully and prayerfully, as one pastor put it, our children and grandchildren will never have to know what abortion is.

As I quote part of a song, "Hands of God", by The Newsboys, I am reminded just how truly amazing our God is. "In the hands of God, we stand tall. Hands that are mighty, to deliver, giving us freedom. You're amazing. You're amazing You are. And we praise You, Lord for what Your hands have done. You're amazing, You're amazing You are."

Anytime that song comes on Klove I can't help but lift my hands and worship who God is and what He has done. He proved that last night.

"Thank you Jesus for being powerful, our deliverer and mighty to save!!"

Joey and I

The board of directors

I Want to Be Your Hands

Remember the Audio Adrenaline song? Not sure of the title, but it talks about being the hands and feet of Jesus to those around us.

Last Saturday, a groups of four guys came and served us; being the hands and feet of Jesus to us. I was told their small group wanted to do something for us and they would do whatever needed to be done. With Libby's surgery and Joey's second job, we had gotten a little behind on things here, plus not to mention the catastrophes we happened upon when we got home from the hospital.

They showed up around 10:15 and immediately began chainsawing our broken tree and cutting up the salvageable pieces into firewood and then hauling off the smaller limbs. It's a good thing Graham had his trailer because there ain't no way that stump would have fit into our lawn mower trailer! It was huge to say the least. Picture to follow later. After that, they all tackled the yard and did a great job! I have to mention the fact that Graham asked one of the guys, Aaron I think, if he weed eated down by the mailboxes, and I thought umm...we never do that, but go ahead if you like.! Made me laugh. We never thought about weed eating down there. Poor Ty tackled my beat up trellis and trimmed back my suckle. Just got to figure out what to put up next to re-train my vine that will sustain 60 mph winds. Casey was getting beat up pretty badly over lunch about being able to push mow our whole front yard in like two strides...yes, he's tall! Poor Casey. They even hung a ceiling fan in my room. Aren't these guys great?! It feels so good to lay under swiftly moving air and to top if off, Joey no longer needs his fan on his side of the bed...yes, we both have fans on each side. Did I mention we were both hot natured??

Not to forget the girls who had a hand in bringing us lunch. Summer and Terrie came to hang out and they brought sandwich fixings and dessert to top it off.

Joey and I were a little overwhelmed by their desire to come and do manual labor for us. I mean, who are we that someone would want to do something like that for us? It was very humbling for us to let them...we are not normally on the receiving end of things like that where someone just "volunteers" to serve without being asked. It was an eye-opener for us. How many times do we tell people, "Let me know if you need anything?" Do they ever call you up and say, "Um. yeah, my yard needs mowing and my house is a wreck if you know of a group that would like to come." Yeah, like who's going to do that? I certainly wouldn't. Knowing that I don't do that and other's don't as well, just show up and offer your services. Don't wait to be asked and don't wait til someone is on their death bed to serve them. I ALWAYS get a greater blessing by serving someone else than they do. I think sometimes Christians do far too much talking and not enough doing. It's time to put feet into action...love, bless, serve.

On top of that huge blessing, we were blessed again that same day with our dearest friends in the world coming to help (No wait, I think Josh did it all himself) Joey fix his car. Josh and Candy, Dan and Lisa, and Joel, Josh and Candy's fellow soon-to-be Philippine missionary friend, came and I know didn't intend to stay until 10:45. Josh and Joel are airplane mechanics, but can basically fix anything. Joey and Dan said they basically watched and learned. It took them 4 hours to fix the car! It was more than Joey bargained for when he ordered the part himself and thought he could do it. By the look of the part it did look complicated! It's all done and it saved us over $350 of taking it to the shop. We had a great time fellowshipping and I'm sure the guys got in much needed guy time even if their heads were underneath a car hood all evening.

Don't we have such great friends? We are so blessed! We were touched and are still humbled by everyone's labor of love. Thank you all again from us. Keep serving! Keep being the hands and feet of Jesus!