Summer of Silence by Allen Kittinger (Summer Intern)

Thu, 8 Jul 2010 13:41:02 -0500

Shut up. You’ve heard these words before: maybe from a parent, sibling, or friend. Maybe you heard them from a stranger when you tried to share the Good News. No matter what the source was, the words hurt.
But what if these words came from God?
Throughout my life I have been an extrovert. I am a very social and talkative person. When in a conversation (or maybe even just near one), I feel like I need to put in my two cents about every topic and every discussion. If someone tells a story, and I have a similar experience, I feel compelled to toss my story in, whether or not it is welcomed. I have spent a lot of time with my foot in my mouth after having said something I could not take back, but wish I could.
I have also spent much of my life with this same attitude in my conversations with God. I like to dominate the conversation, telling God what I want or how I want certain situations to turn out. I ask Him to speak to me, but I don’t give Him the chance to do so. I have given God my two cents on how and where I think or want my life to go.
But then I came down to UTRI for the summer. I came with that same attitude in the beginning: I had an idea of what I wanted God to show me, and MY plan was to discover it through prayer. I started reading a book called Crazy Love, by Francis Chan. The first paragraph reads like this:
“What if I said, ‘Stop praying’? What if I told you to stop talking at God for a while, but instead to take a long, hard look at Him before you speak another word? Solomon warned us not to rush into God’s presence with words. That’s what fools do. And often, that’s what we do.”
Those last two sentences about fools really hit me. This was God telling me to shut up. It made me stop and think about my prayer life. I didn’t pray for that whole next week unless I was asked to do so in a group context. I shut my mouth, and God opened my ears. God spoke to me in my silence. He spoke to me through His Word. He revealed the next step in my journey to fulfill His plan, and I couldn’t be more excited about it.
If you can’t hear God speaking, maybe you need to be silent. Open your ears, open His Word, and shut up.

Lord of the Harvest by Clay Anderson

Sun, 21 Feb 2010 18:49:51 -0600

I was blessed to be able to attend an event honoring Dr. Clara Jarvis for her life long service to Christ. She, with her husband, began a ministry called New Life League. Today they are called New Life Advanced International. They have produced and distributed over a million bibles and tracts. New Life has also sent out missionaries into various parts of the world. God has blessed many people through the obedience of Fred and Clara Jarvis. It is an honor to call her my friend.

The event was a surprise. Mrs. Jarvis thought she was speaking about missions at a church. She was shocked to see all those who attended this event to honor her. When they gave her the stage she said, "I have prepared a message to encourage you all to go on mission, but you already are." She asked David Depew, the president of New Life, to read Matthew 9:35-38.

Jesus was going through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness.
Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. “Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.”

Mrs Jarvis then said something I did not expect to hear. She basically said, "I have heard many sermons on God our provider, the Prince of Peace, the Lord our Healer but I have never heard (in her 92 years) a sermon on the Lord of the Harvest."

I began thinking. I have heard plenty of sermons about this passage. I have heard sermons on praying for workers. I have heard sermons on "going". I have heard sermons on how God knows those to be harvested. I have heard good and bad sermons, short and long sermons , but NEVER a sermon on the Lord of the Harvest. Personally, I have preached on the Lord our Healer, Provider, Companion, Comforter, Father, Husband, Friend, Creator and even Rock, but never have I preached on God as the Lord of the Harvest. I had only thought about praying for the harvest and and workers. So, that night I made a commitment to myself and God. I will study this passage and preach on the Lord of the Harvest to as many people as I can.

It would become too long for me to put the study into this blog so for now I will leave you with this thought: If we can look at a passage like this and miss something so big and beautiful and the LORD OF THE HARVEST, then we need to look closer at all of the Bible as we read. Do not let yourself glide over passages you have heard sermons on your whole life. Write them down on paper and make them into an outline or try putting yourself "there" in the roles of the different characters or whatever works for you. Just do not let yourself miss something as beautiful as the Lord of the Harvest simply because "you already know that part".

For such a time as this by Madison estes

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 13:06:01 -0600

In Language School one of our assignments every week was to write a three page paper in Spanish, and we were given the topics to write about. One of them was a topic for teens, and when it was one of the ladies turn to present her paper there was something that caught my attention and it’s something that keeps coming back to me in different ways. This lady was talking about some different things/people and one of them was Esther and she read Esther 4:14, which is, “For if you remain silent at this time, relief and deliverance for the Jews will arise from another place, but you and your father's family will perish. And who knows but that you have come to royal position for such a time as this?" And then the lady in my class said, “You know what? You all, well, all of us, were born for such a time as this.” And when I heard this that revelation really came to me, and I was like “Wow, that’s so true, I’m here for this time, I wasn’t suppose to be here on Earth for any other time because God has his plan for me and it is supposed to unfold right now.” I thought it was just really cool, but you know, I had that moment of being in awe and then went on with my life.
Almost three weeks ago was Thanksgiving and my family and I went to Kentucky (where we are from) to spend it with our family. Since we are not going to be home for Christmas, we got to open some of our Christmas presents already. One gift that was given to mom and I was the book “Crazy Love.” It is really good, and I’d definitely recommend it, and I’m not even through with it yet. :) Anyways, there was a part in this book that got me thinking about what I was talking about earlier again. The author was talking about a trip he had taken just to have some alone time with God and he said that he started reading in Jeremiah and when he got to Jeremiah 1:4-5 which says, “The word of the LORD came to me, saying, ‘Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations’”, he was like “Wow, God knew me even before I existed!” Then the author said all of this: “When I digested this, all my other relationships seemed trivial by comparison. God has been with me from the start- in fact, well before the start. My next thought, alone in the woods, was that He determined what Jeremiah would do before he was even born. I questioned whether that was also true of me. Maybe all of this pertained only to Jeremiah’s life? Then I remembered Ephesians 2:10, which tells us that we were created ‘to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.’ That verse is meant for me and all others who have been ‘saved by grace through faith.’ My existence was not random, nor was it an accident. God knew who he was creating, and He designed me for a specific work.”
When I read this I was in awe again. I truly am made for a specific purpose and God knew that even before I was born! What an amazing God we have!
Remember and be encouraged that we all have specific purposes from God and we were born for “Such a time as this.”

Prison Ministry by Katie Stokes

Mon, 9 Nov 2009 15:08:53 -0600

Over the past few months I have had the opportunity to go to the prison in Reynosa with a group from Rio Grande Bible Institute. The ladies and I go to the women’s side of the prison to hold a weekly bible study each Thursday. Through this ministry I have learned the importance of looking at the heart of man rather than just the externals.
When I first went to the prison I have to admit it was hard for me to keep my jaw from dropping to the floor. The place itself is nicely kept with Hibiscus bushes lining the walkways and Aloe Vera plants spread throughout the picnic area outside the women’s bunkhouse. However, as I entered the bunkhouse I was hit with the fact that I was walking among women who had committed all types of crimes.
Some of the prisoners are prostitutes, others are drug addicts, and one of the women underwent a sex change. I knew that I was in over my head and wondered what I had gotten myself into. I remember thinking, “Does God really love them despite all of the terrible things they have done?” Grace or mercy, I did not have. I went in with the attitude that said, “you did the crime now you’ve gotta do the time!” After my first trip over I was not sure if I would ever go back. I began to pray that if that was where God wanted me that He would give me the love and the new eyes that I needed to see these women as He saw them.
Recently I have seen a big difference in how I view the prisoners. I have been given the compassion that I needed. My eyes well up with tears when I hear the women’s desires to see their families and to finally be free from behind bars. I am realizing that there is not a big difference between them and myself. We have both made mistakes and done things we regret. I mess up every day, but I know that He has forgiven me.
My job there is to love them and be sure that they see Christ through me. I want them to know that there is forgiveness from their sins. I am His living breathing representative and my only hope is that they will see Christ in me. I pray that one day they will eat of the bread of life and drink of the blood He shed for them.

Redeeming mattresses by Travis Stokes

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 18:20:40 -0500

On August first 2009, Katie and I wed on the beach of South Padre Island. It was a beautiful wedding and a beautiful day. When we returned from our honeymoon, I started Spanish language school and Katie started work at UTRI. The beginning of our married life has not been all easy, but it has been great experiencing life together as we learn. I want to share one of our challenges.
We used some of our wedding money to buy ourselves a mattress. We wanted to spread our money a little further so we decided to buy a new, low-end mattress. We had been told that the one thing we shouldn’t skimp on was the mattress, but we thought it would be fine. As I signed the receipt I read in bold letters, “No Refunds, No Exceptions.” It wasn’t long before I observed that these mattresses were not the quality that we had thought initially. We began to feel stupid thinking that we should have listened to advice. And after sleeping on the mattresses for a few days, buyer’s regret had fully set in. We slept fine on them, but every time we looked at them we felt like we had made the wrong choice. And we knew that they would not have the longevity of a higher-grade mattress. We just wanted to start over.
I posted the mattresses on Craig’s List. I got dead-end emails and then finally, after a couple of weeks. I got in touch with a lady who wanted to come buy them. I was so eager to get rid of them that I even offered to deliver them to her house. She came out and said she liked them and she bought them for just a little under what I had originally paid. As I drove away from her house I felt so relieved; we could finally go out and buy a mattress that we didn’t feel guilty about. The next day at school I got a call. It was from her. I was just not at all glad to hear from her. I answered and she told me that when her husband got home he hated the mattresses. He thought they were cheap and he told her that if the kids jumped on them that they would break right in two. He had told her that they couldn’t keep them. They had paid cash for them and everyone knows that on Craig’s List you buy “as is.” I offered to pay her fifty dollars just to keep them and be happy, but she refused. So I sadly and disappointedly told her that I would take them back. “We are going to be stuck with these cursed mattresses forever,” I thought to myself. After a few hours of sulking I got a call from a guy who wanted to buy my mattresses. I called the lady and told her that if she was going to bring them back she needed to be there by 6:30 because I had a guy coming to look at them at 7:00. I called her at 6:30 because she hadn’t come yet and she said she wasn’t going to make it until at least 7:30. Frustrated, I told her, “No later than 7:30!” She agreed. The guy, Jacob, was very easy going about it and agreed to come later. Eight O’clock came and Jacob was almost here but the mattresses were not. I had to tell him that he was going to have to wait because someone was returning them and they had not made it yet. He became a little concerned about the mattresses but said that he would still come. He got to our apartment and there were no mattresses, but he was still surprisingly chill. He asked what we did and we told him we were missionaries. He got a big grin on his face and told us that he was a believer. He said that God does all things for a reason and that it was worth the trip just to fellowship. He told us about his story and how he was separated from his wife, but God uses hardships like that to get your focus back on Him. He said that since then he had been really seeking God and to be a better husband. We talked for fifteen minutes before the lady finally arrived with the mattresses. Jacob helped me unload them and then the lady continued to tell him how bad the mattresses were and how her husband told her that they would break right in two. Finally she left. Jacob tried out the mattresses and then, very pleased said that he would take them. I was astonished. After all that and he wants to buy them. He said that he thought it was God’s will that he take the mattresses off our hands. As he was leaving he told me that if I ever needed anyone to talk to I should give him a call. I told him we should go out for coffee sometime.
This story was very encouraging to me. God really used it to show me his faithfulness and care for us. It was hard giving that lady her money back. In the business world it was a poor move, but God blessed us for it because we were doing what was right and not trying to watch out for ourselves. It is encouraging because He was telling me that He is watching out for us and that if we trust Him, He is going to take care of us wherever and whatever the situation.