this is what i shared with the student body of EL Theological Seminary during yesterday's (Saturday, 8/2/08) chapel:
Webster’s Dictionary defines “testimony” as: “firsthand authentication of a fact: an outward sign or evidence; an open acknowledgment and/or a public profession of religious experience.” And when we as Christians are asked to give our personal testimony, we are publicly acknowledging our experience as a child of God. Just as we are all personally different and unique, in the same way, our personal testimony of coming to know the Lord and our ongoing spiritual journey is also unique.
For me, I was 6 years old when I accepted Christ as my personal Savior during our nightly family devotions with my mother. We were reading John Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress.” I remember being scared about going to hell and that helped clinch the decision for me.
Actually, it was an easy decision for me to make. Looking back, I think the advantages of being saved at an early age include the fact:
1) That the process from going from unsaved to saved appears seamless. I really did feel like I had been a Christian all my life.
2) I didn’t have to struggle with the decision as it just made sense to me to become “saved.” And also because it seemed to be expected of me.
On the other hand, the disadvantages of being saved at such an early age seemed to me to be:
1) Taking for granted the fact that this decision IS life-changing and should not be taken lightly
2) Seems more exciting and life-changing to become a Christian after being an unbeliever for so long, especially after sowing one’s “wild oats”
On top of becoming a Christian at a young age, I was also a PK, pastor’s kid. Being a PK meant having to be at church every Sunday and even for prayer meetings on Wednesday nights. When our family went to the States in 1965 in order for my parents to pursue their graduate studies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, we traveled every Sunday to different churches in Illinois and Wisconsin and in the summer, we would venture out even further into Iowa, South Dakota, Michigan. This was how my father provided for the family – by preaching in different churches. Our whole family would sing one or two songs and my brother, sister and I would play our instruments before my father preached. All of this meant that we had to be on our best behavior and had to act and be “spiritual” because we were, after all, PKs, even if we didn’t feel like it at times. But, I am grateful for the discipline during those years, because it helped to keep me on the straight and narrow in later years. One result of this discipline early on in my life is that I have always made it a priority to be in church on Sunday. And this is one practice or habit that I’m thankful my children have also incorporated into their lives.
When I was 15, my dad was asked to be the missionary speaker at Camp Willabay in Wisconsin. It was during that summer that I joined the other campers in rededicating my life to the Lord, promising Him that I would go into full-time Christian service someday. Of course, I didn’t know what that decision would entail and it wouldn’t be until many years later that I would hear the call to serve the Lord full-time.
My high school years were spent at Faith Academy, a Christian school in Manila. During my sophomore, junior and senior years, I was a member of the MadriGals and Guys, an exclusive singing group at Faith. During those 3 years, as we traveled all over the Philippines giving concerts, we also had to be ready to give our personal testimony as we never knew when our director, Dick Cadd, would tell us it was our turn to share. Those years proved to be a great time of learning for me with respect to sharing my spiritual journey with people we would meet during our concerts. Those years really stretched and strengthened my faith. I would say that I grew a lot spiritually because of the MadriGals and Guys.
In early May 1974, I graduated from Faith Academy and from April to June of that year, because the majority of us had just graduated and were headed to the States for college, the MadriGals and Guys went on an overseas tour. We traveled to Athens, then on to Germany, Amsterdam, and London, before landing in New York for the US leg of our tour. We traveled from Rhode Island to Illinois, singing almost every night and sometimes during the day at high schools and colleges along the way. If ever I could say there was a high point in my Christian experience, it would be those 3 months when my faith was tested, but I found encouragement and enjoyment in serving the Lord through music and sharing my faith with others. I experienced the greatest growth in my Christian life during this time because all of my focus was upon the ministry we were doing and being a good testimony for the Lord wherever we happened to be. It was a truly wonderful and life-changing experience!
Unfortunately, that “spiritual” high was followed by many lows when I had to stay behind in Chicago at the end of the tour so I could earn some money before starting college @ Trinity that fall. First, it was hard to be SO far away from my family. Second, working in a home for mentally challenged kids really tested my faith because I had never in my life been around kids who had so many problems and whose families had decided they could no longer care for them, so they gave that responsibility over to this home for the mentally handicapped. It was a truly eye-opening experience for me.
I thought things would be better once I was in school with fellow Christians, but my freshman year proved to be another low point for me spiritually. Of course, the low point was a result of a broken heart! I was just one of many girls in college who felt this way after a relationship fell through, but at the time, I thought I was the only one going through such pain. I remember writing my parents a long letter about my heartache and telling them that I didn’t think God could be a God of love if He allows us to suffer so much! Needless to say, I was very angry with God for most of my freshman year.
But, God has a way of drawing us back to Himself. He allows those difficult times to come into our lives so that we will grow and mature and He brings people into our lives to encourage us to “keep the faith” and to trust in God’s divine plan for our lives. My parents were especially instrumental in my coming back to the Lord because instead of condemning me for “hating” God during my freshman year, they just kept praying for me and their prayers and love and support during that very difficult year showed me that God really did care about me and that He DOES has a wonderful plan for my life.
It’s sad, but it’s also a fact that being in a Christian college doesn’t always strengthen your faith. It’s very common for many college students to stray from their faith because of the excitement of being away from home and being independent for the first time. But, because of my parents’ prayers and the Christian heritage that I grew up in and was blessed with, despite the backsliding, the many crises of faith that I experienced and the times of unfaithfulness, God, on the other hand just continued to prove Himself faithful to me over and over again. I know that He protected me from myself and the unwise choices that I made, from people who might have wanted to harm me or influence me for evil and He did all that because He has something great in store for me. And, I firmly believe this, He continued to love me and protect me because I had made that promise to go into full-time Christian service some day.
My spiritual journey has not been a smooth one. I don’t know of anyone whose journey to become a true child of God has not been marked with backsliding, hardships, testings, doubt, and fear. But I DO know this – God IS faithful. God DOES know what He is doing in our lives and He will accomplish what He has divinely ordained for us, despite our backsliding, our unfaithfulness, our stubbornness. He continues to remain faithful to us.
My Christian life has not been a straight, upward moving line. It’s been full of ups and downs, moments of doubt, wanting to give up & failures. Our family went through our deepest valley nine years ago. It was something that crushed and almost destroyed us. But, as I limped along, trying to recover my sanity and my self-worth, I literally felt like God was propping me up during those heart-breaking years through the prayers that were being uttered for us and through my wonderful female friends who walked through that deep, dark valley with me – praying me through and encouraging me in my faith every step of the way. I really can’t thank God enough for friends like that!! During those dark days, I clung to Psalm 91, verses 1, 2, & 11: “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust…For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.”
Needless to say, that painful experience was another turning point in my life. It was God’s way of breaking me and making me more dependent on Him. It’s a lesson that I continue to fall back on even now. Through those dark days, God showed Himself to be truly compassionate, ever loving, the healer of broken hearts. And as a result of that, I felt that He had made me more compassionate and understanding of the aches and heartaches that people, especially women, are experiencing. It was a few years later when I felt like I was on my way to healing emotionally that God reminded me of the promise I had made when I was 15 to go into full-time Christian ministry and that’s when the desire to return “home” started to take root and grow. Sometime that I just realized today is that God prepared me for moving back here by allowing me to return 7 times in the past 5 years!! Each visit made it seem more and more like I was “coming home…”
So, now, here we are in Cebu. I won’t enumerate the steps or process of how we got here since Dan already shared that with you last Saturday. We’ve come by faith, having taken early retirement from our jobs. Our kids, especially our youngest daughter Erin, worry about our finances because we are now living off of our savings. But, we’re trusting God to provide for ALL our needs because we have seen firsthand His faithfulness over and over again in my parents’ lives and in this ministry that God has given to them. This same God that my parents have put their full faith and trust in ALL these years is the same God who KNOWS and holds my future. He has been faithful to me in the past. He’s brought me this far and I KNOW He will be faithful in the years to come.
In closing, let me share with you one of my favorite verses that never fails to bring a smile to my heart as I anticipate the future that awaits me in heaven with our wonderful Lord and Savior who loves me and has only my best interest at heart--Psalm 16:11: “Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence [is] fulness of joy; at thy right hand [there are] pleasures for evermore.”
Webster’s Dictionary defines “testimony” as: “firsthand authentication of a fact: an outward sign or evidence; an open acknowledgment and/or a public profession of religious experience.” And when we as Christians are asked to give our personal testimony, we are publicly acknowledging our experience as a child of God. Just as we are all personally different and unique, in the same way, our personal testimony of coming to know the Lord and our ongoing spiritual journey is also unique.
For me, I was 6 years old when I accepted Christ as my personal Savior during our nightly family devotions with my mother. We were reading John Bunyan’s “Pilgrim’s Progress.” I remember being scared about going to hell and that helped clinch the decision for me.
Actually, it was an easy decision for me to make. Looking back, I think the advantages of being saved at an early age include the fact:
1) That the process from going from unsaved to saved appears seamless. I really did feel like I had been a Christian all my life.
2) I didn’t have to struggle with the decision as it just made sense to me to become “saved.” And also because it seemed to be expected of me.
On the other hand, the disadvantages of being saved at such an early age seemed to me to be:
1) Taking for granted the fact that this decision IS life-changing and should not be taken lightly
2) Seems more exciting and life-changing to become a Christian after being an unbeliever for so long, especially after sowing one’s “wild oats”
On top of becoming a Christian at a young age, I was also a PK, pastor’s kid. Being a PK meant having to be at church every Sunday and even for prayer meetings on Wednesday nights. When our family went to the States in 1965 in order for my parents to pursue their graduate studies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, we traveled every Sunday to different churches in Illinois and Wisconsin and in the summer, we would venture out even further into Iowa, South Dakota, Michigan. This was how my father provided for the family – by preaching in different churches. Our whole family would sing one or two songs and my brother, sister and I would play our instruments before my father preached. All of this meant that we had to be on our best behavior and had to act and be “spiritual” because we were, after all, PKs, even if we didn’t feel like it at times. But, I am grateful for the discipline during those years, because it helped to keep me on the straight and narrow in later years. One result of this discipline early on in my life is that I have always made it a priority to be in church on Sunday. And this is one practice or habit that I’m thankful my children have also incorporated into their lives.
When I was 15, my dad was asked to be the missionary speaker at Camp Willabay in Wisconsin. It was during that summer that I joined the other campers in rededicating my life to the Lord, promising Him that I would go into full-time Christian service someday. Of course, I didn’t know what that decision would entail and it wouldn’t be until many years later that I would hear the call to serve the Lord full-time.
My high school years were spent at Faith Academy, a Christian school in Manila. During my sophomore, junior and senior years, I was a member of the MadriGals and Guys, an exclusive singing group at Faith. During those 3 years, as we traveled all over the Philippines giving concerts, we also had to be ready to give our personal testimony as we never knew when our director, Dick Cadd, would tell us it was our turn to share. Those years proved to be a great time of learning for me with respect to sharing my spiritual journey with people we would meet during our concerts. Those years really stretched and strengthened my faith. I would say that I grew a lot spiritually because of the MadriGals and Guys.
In early May 1974, I graduated from Faith Academy and from April to June of that year, because the majority of us had just graduated and were headed to the States for college, the MadriGals and Guys went on an overseas tour. We traveled to Athens, then on to Germany, Amsterdam, and London, before landing in New York for the US leg of our tour. We traveled from Rhode Island to Illinois, singing almost every night and sometimes during the day at high schools and colleges along the way. If ever I could say there was a high point in my Christian experience, it would be those 3 months when my faith was tested, but I found encouragement and enjoyment in serving the Lord through music and sharing my faith with others. I experienced the greatest growth in my Christian life during this time because all of my focus was upon the ministry we were doing and being a good testimony for the Lord wherever we happened to be. It was a truly wonderful and life-changing experience!
Unfortunately, that “spiritual” high was followed by many lows when I had to stay behind in Chicago at the end of the tour so I could earn some money before starting college @ Trinity that fall. First, it was hard to be SO far away from my family. Second, working in a home for mentally challenged kids really tested my faith because I had never in my life been around kids who had so many problems and whose families had decided they could no longer care for them, so they gave that responsibility over to this home for the mentally handicapped. It was a truly eye-opening experience for me.
I thought things would be better once I was in school with fellow Christians, but my freshman year proved to be another low point for me spiritually. Of course, the low point was a result of a broken heart! I was just one of many girls in college who felt this way after a relationship fell through, but at the time, I thought I was the only one going through such pain. I remember writing my parents a long letter about my heartache and telling them that I didn’t think God could be a God of love if He allows us to suffer so much! Needless to say, I was very angry with God for most of my freshman year.
But, God has a way of drawing us back to Himself. He allows those difficult times to come into our lives so that we will grow and mature and He brings people into our lives to encourage us to “keep the faith” and to trust in God’s divine plan for our lives. My parents were especially instrumental in my coming back to the Lord because instead of condemning me for “hating” God during my freshman year, they just kept praying for me and their prayers and love and support during that very difficult year showed me that God really did care about me and that He DOES has a wonderful plan for my life.
It’s sad, but it’s also a fact that being in a Christian college doesn’t always strengthen your faith. It’s very common for many college students to stray from their faith because of the excitement of being away from home and being independent for the first time. But, because of my parents’ prayers and the Christian heritage that I grew up in and was blessed with, despite the backsliding, the many crises of faith that I experienced and the times of unfaithfulness, God, on the other hand just continued to prove Himself faithful to me over and over again. I know that He protected me from myself and the unwise choices that I made, from people who might have wanted to harm me or influence me for evil and He did all that because He has something great in store for me. And, I firmly believe this, He continued to love me and protect me because I had made that promise to go into full-time Christian service some day.
My spiritual journey has not been a smooth one. I don’t know of anyone whose journey to become a true child of God has not been marked with backsliding, hardships, testings, doubt, and fear. But I DO know this – God IS faithful. God DOES know what He is doing in our lives and He will accomplish what He has divinely ordained for us, despite our backsliding, our unfaithfulness, our stubbornness. He continues to remain faithful to us.
My Christian life has not been a straight, upward moving line. It’s been full of ups and downs, moments of doubt, wanting to give up & failures. Our family went through our deepest valley nine years ago. It was something that crushed and almost destroyed us. But, as I limped along, trying to recover my sanity and my self-worth, I literally felt like God was propping me up during those heart-breaking years through the prayers that were being uttered for us and through my wonderful female friends who walked through that deep, dark valley with me – praying me through and encouraging me in my faith every step of the way. I really can’t thank God enough for friends like that!! During those dark days, I clung to Psalm 91, verses 1, 2, & 11: “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, He is my refuge and my fortress: my God; in him will I trust…For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways.”
Needless to say, that painful experience was another turning point in my life. It was God’s way of breaking me and making me more dependent on Him. It’s a lesson that I continue to fall back on even now. Through those dark days, God showed Himself to be truly compassionate, ever loving, the healer of broken hearts. And as a result of that, I felt that He had made me more compassionate and understanding of the aches and heartaches that people, especially women, are experiencing. It was a few years later when I felt like I was on my way to healing emotionally that God reminded me of the promise I had made when I was 15 to go into full-time Christian ministry and that’s when the desire to return “home” started to take root and grow. Sometime that I just realized today is that God prepared me for moving back here by allowing me to return 7 times in the past 5 years!! Each visit made it seem more and more like I was “coming home…”
So, now, here we are in Cebu. I won’t enumerate the steps or process of how we got here since Dan already shared that with you last Saturday. We’ve come by faith, having taken early retirement from our jobs. Our kids, especially our youngest daughter Erin, worry about our finances because we are now living off of our savings. But, we’re trusting God to provide for ALL our needs because we have seen firsthand His faithfulness over and over again in my parents’ lives and in this ministry that God has given to them. This same God that my parents have put their full faith and trust in ALL these years is the same God who KNOWS and holds my future. He has been faithful to me in the past. He’s brought me this far and I KNOW He will be faithful in the years to come.
In closing, let me share with you one of my favorite verses that never fails to bring a smile to my heart as I anticipate the future that awaits me in heaven with our wonderful Lord and Savior who loves me and has only my best interest at heart--Psalm 16:11: “Thou wilt shew me the path of life: in thy presence [is] fulness of joy; at thy right hand [there are] pleasures for evermore.”
2 comments:
all I can say is wow!!! My heart swells with joy at the sound of God being glorified through your life. I believe that God is bursting at the seams with love for you. Thank you for sharing your life's journey. I was blessed.
On a side note, I had to chuckle when I read the brief version of what you are doing now...doesn't sound like retirement to me. I am totally praising God right now as I think of what you are doing, where you are living and how you are being used by God. Amazing...truly amazing.
-lila
thank you, lila, for reading my posts and sharing your comments...! i really appreciate it and i appreciate very much your support as it helps to keep me going in this direction that God has led Dan & me.
you and the whole defiesta family are also a great blessing to my family!! SO glad we're family -- here on earth and also in heaven with this great God who loves us so much!!
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