The Call

Crying out to God in prayer, I was not sure what He would answer when I uttered my sincere plea toward heaven, saying:

“I’ll go anywhere and do anything, just tell me where to go and what to do!”

When making that vow to the Lord, I was thinking that I would be willing to live in Tel-Aviv or the Negev Desert or any number of places in Israel. The year before, Bev and I had completed a life changing 86-day ‘Walk of Faith’ through the length and breadth of the ‘Beautiful Land’, hiking the Israel National Trail. We had walked over 600 miles throughout the autumn of 2005, from the base of Mt. Hermon in the north of Israel to Taba on Israel’s southern border with Egypt. Carrying heavily loaded backpacks we had been marvelously sustained by the Lord daily as we prayed over the land and the people of Israel. Now we were in the Jerusalem area, together in fellowship with a mature group of followers of Jesus, and seeking God for further guidance.

Not long after uttering my prayer, I clearly heard the Lord speak into my heart, saying:

“GO TO AFRICA AND TEACH MY WORD!”

Wow, that was totally unexpected. I had never thought about going to Africa, didn’t know anyone in Africa, and simply had no desire or financial means to go to Africa… but God had clearly spoken, so there wasn’t anything to say in response except: “Yes, LORD.”

Without hesitation, I stood up in the prayer meeting and announced that God had just spoken to me. After, sharing the seven words the Lord had voiced, all of us returned to prayer, and shortly thereafter the elders of the congregation stood up and said: “Amen!” They then asked Bev and I to come forward and kneel down. They anointed us with oil and laid hands upon us, committing us to the calling of God to go to Africa and teach His Word. At that moment we knew that God was confirming His Call to us through these men. We were being called from Jerusalem to the uttermost ends of the earth, for His purposes.

There were many things we did not know at the time. We did not know where in Africa we would be going, how long we were going to be in Africa, how we were going to support ourselves in Africa and most importantly who we would be teaching God’s Word to in Africa. A thousand unknowns lay ahead of us but only seven words were all the Lord had spoken that day. Still, His Word to us was sufficient, sustaining us for the next 16 years!

We would arrive a year later in Kenya, (in Hebrew Ken-Yah translates Yes-LORD in English). From the moment we arrived in Africa, we began a great adventure into the unknown, ‘Experiencing God of the Miraculous’ in ways we could not have imagined when we first received ‘The Call’. One of the most important lessons that we would learn over the next decade and a half was that where God guides, He provides!

“Man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

Deuteronomy 8:3, Matthew 4:4