Winter 2008 Newsletter
Life is NOT a Stage
Sometimes we view our lives as speeches. We like to think of it as one to inform or affect or to get an action, but all too often we get distracted and apathy sets in and the thing we were so passionate about at the beginning is forgotten. All seems to be lost but not really, there’s still hope! We can regain focus and be that living testimony that cries out what we believe and what we stand for and that grabs the attention of all who pass by.
There are so many different types of blessings and miracles that I’ve heard of and experienced this tour. It seems like the more we would give God the more he would give back. And as we went into this tour we challenged God to amaze us by out doing us and we would do all we could to out do Him! There was one time in particular that my team had just gotten back from going door to door. I went with one of the girls on my team and we ministered to the different people we met. But the clincher was the last guy that we met before we packed it up. Now this whole time we had been giving the people a tract and telling them Jesus loves them. Then we would ask if they had ever heard of Jesus before and usually they say they had, but this guy said no and said he wanted to know more! At first we panicked and we prayed nervously for God to give us words to say because we had nothing ready, but we plunged in head first. We talked for 10 or 15 minutes and we didn’t ask him to pray a sinner’s prayer or anything but he said he would read the Bible and check this out. It may sound discouraging that he didn’t get saved right there but it wasn’t our job to do that today we just needed to be there to apologize for all the “Christians” that had hurt him and lead him in the right direction. That's what I'm talking about. We give God the time and then he provided the soul for us to encourage. We gave Him the question, "do you know who Jesus is?" and then he gave us someone to respond! If you challenge God, expect him to meet you there and to completely astound you with what pulls out of his sleeve!
This story reminds me of something I read about in 2 Samuel recently. The whole book is about David and how he went from a life devoted to God to an almost abandoning God. One of the verses that stuck out to me was 2 Samuel 14:14: “Like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be recovered, so we must die. But God does not take away life; instead, he devises ways so that a banished person may not remain estranged from him.” WOW!! Do you need to reread that really quickly? There is never a time that God will stop looking for ways to set us free! Jesus does the biggest part but then God plans for people to cross certain paths or a song to play on the radio or for there to be a bill board sign. He will never stop trying. So be encouraged that whatever you may be dealing with, God will always look for ways to set you free. I relate to this, for years I struggled with an addiction and the despair of never being free was breaking me, but the whole time God was thinking of ways to get me out and I can say I have true freedom that I have never felt before! And you can have it too forever.
We have a couple of mission’s trips coming up this year. We have a team going to England in April and then a team going to either Jamaica or Haiti in November. I am going to try to go on the November trip but it can’t be done without help, so if you would like to help me or one of my team mates then use the Pay-pal link on the bottom of our pages, it would be greatly appreciated! More importantly, keep us in your prayers as we do all this. Thanks so much!!
In His love,
John Brooks
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