A life of Ministry...

Thanks for allowing me to share about my time with Dr. Wesley Duewel. After this post, I will have one more entry to share with you.

Dr. Duewel has definitely had a missional life. That hasn't stopped even at the age of 92.

Following the Duewel's 25 years of missionary service in India, Dr. Duewel served as President of OMS International from 1969 - 1982. Since then he has spent time writing numerous books and speaking in 44 countries. Recognized as an authority on missions, he has served on various mission boards. Currently OMS graciously provides him with an office where he serves as President Emeritus and special assistant to the president for evangelism and intercession.

He is currently working on his autobiography. As a writer, I was interested in knowing how he was going about that. He showed me seven three-ring notebooks filled with stories and facts, each one pertaining to a period of his life... so much material that he has to find ways to condense it for his book.

When I visited him in November, he had plans to fly to Wisconsin in just a few weeks to speak at a church who had studied one of his books as a part of their small group ministry. Knowing that his wife passed away just over a year ago, I asked him if he had a traveling companion as I pictured him getting around in airports with cane in hand going about in his shuffling manner. No, there wasn't a travel assistant. He seemed very confident in himself to ask for wheel chair assistance and go it on his own. He did inform me that he is unable to preach standing for the duration of a sermon, so he asks for a stool to be available when his legs no longer hold him up. He is a most humble man, with a gentle spirit.

With all that life has brought him, I asked him, What were some of the keys or perspectives you learned during transitional points in your life?

"God guided us through them all." A simple statement, but one of faith and reliance on a God in whom he places his trust. A trust that has lasted a lifetime of 92 fruitful years.

As one who just recently went through a transitional time in life (not the first one, nor the last), I want to keep my eyes on God, placing my full trust in He who is the author and finisher of my faith. Someday when I am in the concluding years of life, thinking through life transitions, I want to be able to say, God guided us through them all.

In Others' Words...

When God has people who prevail in prayer, and people who know how to recognize the voice of the Spirit and obey without question, there is no limit to what God can do.

(In keeping with my reflections from my time with Dr. Duewel, I thought it appropriate to quote from
Let God Guide You Daily by Wesley Duewel, Zondervan, 1988, pp. 117-119.)

More thoughts from Wesley Duewel

Persevering prayer... another good reminder from my time with Dr. Duewel. We give up too soon, lacking the patience to see God through in any given situation.

Tears came to my eyes when Dr. Duewel spoke of his mother who he described as a "prayer warrior." If anything, one of my callings as a mother is to pray. While sharing the story of his mother he began rummaging through a file folder that had papers upon papers (in no particular order) of hundreds of poems he has written over the years. When he found what he was looking for he began to read a poem he had written on the day of his mother's funeral. He was in India at the time, unable to return to the states for her funeral.

THE PRAYERS OF SAINTS LIVE ON

The prayers of saints live on and on;
They still live when the saints are gone.
They live and work throughout the earth
And o'er and o'er they prove their worth.
The years and centuries pass by
But prayers of saints shall never die.

Each prayer prayed in God's holy will
Our God is oath-bound to fulfill.
The Holy Spirit guides such prayer
And in its praying has His share.
When He makes our requests His own
We know God's answer will be shown.

Whene'er man in the Spirit pleads
Then Jesus Christ, too, intercedes.
The prayers Christ prays can never fail;
His intercession will prevail.
His holy prayer will never end
Till God's full answer He can send.

The prayers of saints live on and on
Until God's perfect answers dawn.
The Son and Spirit join their prayer
And in the intercession share.
The saints may join their Lord on high,
But prayers of saints can never die.

(Written on the occasion of my mother's homegoing;
Allahabad, India - March 2, 1962)

Persevere - persistence, tirelessness, staying power, purposefulness, patience, endurance - "Till God's full answer He can send." (italics mine) This line caught my attention. Often I don't know what God's full answer is and so I get impatient because God is not answering according to my ways or in my time (which is when it's easy to give up), thus missing out on God's full and perfect answer. His thoughts are not always our thoughts and his ways not always our ways. I must be patient to let God work out things in his time and in his ways.

Faith for the Long Haul - 2

Dr. Wesley Duewel may look feeble at the age of 92 as he shuffles about with his cane, but his sharp mind, strength of character, and strong faith made an impression on me. This past November I was able to spend two hours with Dr. Duewel during a visit to Indianapolis. He was gracious to meet with me. I was thrilled to meet this man of faith and prayer.

We walked into his office at OMS International surrounded by shelves of books and mementos from around the world. For lack of shelf space the books he authored translated into numerous languages (61) are lined up on the floor in front of his study desk. Touch the World through Prayer (1,000,000 copies in print), Let God Guide You Daily, Ablaze for God, Mighty Prevailing Prayer, and Measure Your Life are just a few of his books. Later in our conversation about revival he took a frame from his shelf that housed a page from the Bible owned by Evan Roberts, the young man who helped to begin the Welsh revival in 1904.

I was most impressed with his heart for God, the world, and his confidence in a God who hears and answers prayer. I am a woman of many questions, so I went with my notebook in hand hoping to glean from this man's life experiences grounded in a deep faith.

When did your heart for prayer begin?

He told me the story of how as a five-year-old playing in his sandbox he heard the Lord say to him, I want you to go to India. He ran into the house and said, Mommy, mommy, God told me to go to India. And mommy, mommy, I want you to go with me. (Of course, a 5-year-old would want his mom to go with him!) He fondly remembers his mother's heart and tears for China during their family prayer times and she was a bit disappointed that God wouldn't send him to China. Although he didn't go to China he says his mother's prayers were answered through him since a half million of his books are in China.

He never forgot or lost the call. While a student at Bible College he began to pray six requests over a 2-year period. Each night he would watch for the library lights to go out, then he would let himself in with a key and pray by a dimly lit globe over the six requests. They all had to do with going to India. He saw all six answered by the time he left for India just one year after his college graduation, and along with his new wife, spent the next 25 years serving the people of India through OMS.

I was reminded again that there is faith in asking God for specific things. I just finished reading through the book of Genesis. In chapter 24, Abraham, living in the land of the Canaanites, sends his chief servant to find a wife for his son Isaac in his home country. His servant prays a very specific prayer and watches God answer that prayer. When we know that we are asking in line with God's will, we can be specific in prayer.

More on Dr. Duewel next time...

Faith for the Long Haul

Two men. Both in their 90's. Both men of faith. Both have made an impact on the world.

Billy Graham and Wesley Duewel.

You've all heard of Billy Graham, but possibly not of Wesley Duewel. Not too long ago I finished Billy Graham's autobiography, Just As I Am. Although he personally connected with every U.S. President since the time of Truman, he didn't make his mission political. He wasn't about causes, though his organization provided humanitarian aid to various catastrophes around the world. I am amazed at this man's influence. He got into countries at a time when no one else was welcome. What I love about Billy Graham is that he stuck to his mission. He simply wanted to share the Gospel message. And that he did in exponential ways!

I was drawn to read his life story because my childhood and teenage years were influenced by the evangelistic crusades that Billy Graham is noted for. It was at an evangelistic service at my home church that I first made a commitment to follow Christ at the age of ten. Then in 1972 as a teenager I renewed that commitment at a deeper level at a Campus Crusade event called Explo '72 in Dallas, TX. Though the methods of evangelism have changed, these tools that put me in the way of God were definitely life-shaping.

Back in November I had the privilege to meet with Dr. Wesley Duewel. This is a long time coming... but I wanted to share about my time with him. I will do this over the next few posts. How sweet it was to sit with Dr. Duewel for two hours and hear his stories of the faithfulness of God. Until next time...

In Others' Words...

I'm one of those people who love quotes. They challenge and inspire me. So, each week I'll be posting a quote that has done just that for me. Maybe it's something I've heard in person, in a movie, or in a Sunday morning message. Or maybe it will come from a book, magazine or newspaper.

I came across this one while reading the recent Reader's Digest. My Dad has been gifting the RD to us since I think we've been married, which is 30 years. Thanks Dad! It makes great bathroom reading material :). This quote comes from our very own Governor of MI, Jennifer Granholm:

Sometimes leadership is planting trees under whose shade you'll never sit.

More from the deep freeze...

I know... I'm obsessed with the weather. I'm actually a warm-weather person, but if you enjoy the seasons, you've got to put up with snow. Frankly, I've seen my share of snow for this winter. I like what my friend/fellow blogger Erica Allen put on her blog recently about the coldest winter we've had in 8 years. She and her husband, Jon, are church planting here in West MI after moving from Virginia just over a year ago. Welcome to Michigan, huh?

It's so cold that...
1. windshield wiper fluid freezes on the window.
2. the snot in your nose freezes.
3. a two-liter of pop left in the garage will explode.
4. when the sun comes out, none of the snow melts.
5. ice forms on the inside of our bedroom window.
6. there are no double digits on the thermometers unless it has a negative in front of it.

Here are some recent pictures. The colors of the day seem to be consistently white and gray around here (sigh):

Heading down 104 on a snowy Sunday morning

Dennis keeps shoveling the driveway...

and a very serving neighbor keeps coming by
with his plow to push the mounds back.

Nope, we didn't take the grill in this winter... should have.

I wrote this post on Sunday night... since then we have had two days of sunshine, but the snows not melting :(.

Mad Church Disease coming soon!

A fellow blogger, Anne Jackson, has her first book coming out on February 9th. Click on her name to get to her blog where you can preorder the book and/or download a chapter called Processing Through Pain. Also, here is her author site.

After reading the free chapter, I have no doubt that this book will be a helpful resource for those in ministry.

You think there's a difference?

With family scattered all over the country, I keep the
weather readings of each city as one of my widgets on my desktop.
It's a bit depressing sometimes, as you can see.

A photo, a small wooden picture of Mary, and white gloves...

Three random items that had special meaning for a 14-year-old girl named Lily.

This week I finished The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd. I remember enjoying Kidd's writings published in Guidepost magazine years ago. It's a great read! I have yet to see the movie, but I'm told that the movie is as good as the book.

The setting: 1964, South Carolina, during the civil rights movement. She shares her journey with her caretaker, Rosaleen... one of the pickers her Dad pulled from the peach orchard right after her mother died. Lily becomes friends with three black calendar sisters - May, June, and August. August especially helps Lily discover the secrets that lie in her heart.

My favorite lines:

"There is nothing perfect," August said from the door way. "There is only life."

Regrets don't help anything, August had told June, you know that.

Christmas Pics...

I had way too many pictures that I wanted to share (that's what grandkids do to ya), so I picked out a few highlights of Christmas. Most have Evee in them, well maybe all of them :).

The ornaments piqued Evee's curiosity

Dancing to A Charlie Brown's Christmas music

Stocking time

Had to get Evee out in the snow

Plenty of snow on the deck to slide down the stairs

All bundled up

Fun with Papa

Several visits to the Spring Lake Sports & Aquatic Center

Auntie Julie joined us after a visit to Josh & Kari

Grandma takes all the pictures, but finally
got one of Evee & me