Work It, Lord

Evangelist Billy Graham recently celebrated his 95^th birthday on November 7th.  After more than seven decades and millions of souls saved through his Crusades the message of The Cross still resounds with Hope & Healing.

Billy Graham Crusade
Cleveland Stadium 1972

Forty years ago last summer I responded to Billy’s call.  Escorted by Mom, my brother Jim and I made our way from the upper deck of Cleveland Stadium to receive Christ as our personal Lord & Savior.  Wow was I on FIRE for the Lord!  At the tender age of 13 I had no doubt that Jesus loved me and had a Plan and a Purpose for my life. 

Unfortunately we no longer attended church as a family.  And despite feeble follow-up attempts at Discipleship with well-meaning volunteers via mail, without being firmly planted in a local church my red-hot passion for the Lord quickly cooled.

As I watched Billy Graham’s My Hope America Special (four times this month) I felt a deep sense of sorrow. For just like that proverbial seed thrown onto rocky soil that Jesus spoke of in The Parable of the Sower, my faith “sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow.  But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root.”  Matt 13:5-6 NIV

Oh what could have been!  What a lonely lament.  Because I wasted the next thirty years chasing after what the world told me I just had to have in order to be Happy.  Not!  Sadly it took decades to find out that no amount of career success or academic achievement could possibly come close to the passion I felt in my tender teenage  heart so long ago and so very far away.

But fear not!  For rather than being relegated to haplessly wandering the desert for forty years like the Jews, by God’s grace my life sentence was fulfilled in just thirty years.  Because for the past decade I’ve been solidly back on The Right Path, pursuing His plan for my life and eager to see what’s next.

Verily “God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose.“ Romans 8:28 NASB   So work it, Lord!  I can hardly wait to see how He plans to use me to help transform Disability Ministry to prayerfully draw “better-than-Billyesqe” multitudes of people and families affected by disability into a Personal Relationship with Him. 

Oh what a glorious Crusade that shall be.

In His Accessible Grace,

Linda